Steve Bannon vows to banish Elon Musk from Trump's inner circle
Much has been made of the surprising “bromance” that has developed between President-elect Donald Trump and tech billionaire Elon Musk, but there is at least one notable name on the right who is none too pleased about the bond.
As Breitbart reports, former Trump advisor Steve Bannon has made his feelings clear about Musk, promising that he will ensure his ouster from the MAGA inner circle before Jan. 20.
Bannon lets loose
It was during a conservation with Corriere della Sera in Italy that Bannon made his thoughts known about the prospect of Musk's continued influence on Trump and the new administration.
“I will have Elon Musk run out of here by Inauguration Day,” Bannon pledged. “He will not have a blue pass to the White House, he will not have full access to the White House, he will be like any other person.”
Going even further with his animosity, Bannon said, “He is a truly evil guy, a very bad guy. I made it my personal thing to take this guy down. Before, because he put money in, I was prepared to tolerate it; I'm not prepared to tolerate it anymore.”
The ill will Bannon harbors toward Musk is rooted in the latter's support for H-1B visas for skilled immigrants in “specialty occupations,” something Bannon says has been “gamed by the tech overlords” to the detriment of American citizens.
Referencing tech moguls Peter Thiel, David Sachs, and Musk, Bannon mused, “Why do we have South Africans, the most racist people on earth, white South Africans, we have them making any comments at all on what goes ojn in the United States?”
Trump world divided
Though Bannon has left no doubt about how he feels about the visa positioning of Musk as well as fellow Trump ally Vivek Ramaswamy, the president-elect himself seems to have a different take, as the BBC noted.
Ramaswamy recently waded into the debate and drew the ire of many when he blamed American culture for failing to produce sufficient numbers of skilled workers the sort of which the H-1B visa is meant to attract.
Trump, for his part, seems to agree with Musk and Ramaswamy, telling the New York Post recently that he “always liked” the visa program and had hired for his own enterprises under its provisions.
Even so, Bannon has not softened his view of the program or the tech titans who support it, saying of Musk that his “sole objective is to become a trillionaire,” no matter the cost to the American populace.
While Bannon was appreciative of Musk's financial support for Trump's 2024 campaign, he added, “What's not positive, is when all of a sudden he tries to put his half-baked ideas which are really about the implementation of techno-feudalism on a global scale,” but just how heated this internal MAGA battle may yet become, only time will tell.