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According to Chinanews.com, citing CNN, on the evening of August 12, local time, former US President and Republican presidential candidate Trump and Tesla CEO Musk started an interview on the social platform X (formerly Twitter). According to a previous report by Global Times, Musk revealed in the preview of the interview format that the conversation with Trump would be an "improvisational interview" and "without a script, without subject restrictions, it should be very interesting."

However, throughout the interview, Trump did not put forward any new views and continued to repeat similar narratives. In the interview, Trump focused on criticizing the current Vice President Harris and President Biden, and repeatedly emphasized the role of the current government in issues such as illegal immigration and inflation.

At the same time as the interview was conducted, the Harris-Waltz campaign, which is targeting this year's US presidential election, sent a fundraising appeal to supporters via email. Joseph Costello, a spokesman for the Harris campaign, responded to the interview on the 12th: "Trump's entire campaign serves Elon Musk and people like him - they are a group of self-obsessed rich people who sell out the middle class and can't (smoothly) conduct a live broadcast in 2024."

Recent poll data show that Harris's support in swing states is on the rise. According to a poll released by The New York Times and Siena College on the 10th, cited by Cankaoxiaoxi.com on August 11, her support in the three key swing states of Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania is 4 percentage points ahead of Trump.

Trump repeats old rhetoric

It is worth mentioning that before the interview began, Trump announced his return to the social platform X after several years of silence and published several articles to promote his campaign. However, the interview officially started about 40 minutes later than the scheduled time. Musk claimed that X was attacked by a cyber attack. According to the platform data, more than 1 million people watched the live broadcast.

At Musk's request, Trump spent 20 minutes at the beginning of the interview responding to the attempted assassination in Butler County, Pennsylvania in July, saying that he had become "more of a believer in God" after the incident and announced that he would return to the area in October to hold a campaign rally.

Trump then continued to mention the threat posed by illegal immigrants and criticized Vice President Harris' role in border affairs, describing her as the "border czar" of the Biden administration. "These people (illegal immigrants) were put in jail for murder and various crimes, and now they are released into our country," Trump said.

Global Times quoted CNN as saying that Trump also reiterated his position on closing the Department of Education and advocated that states handle education issues on their own. Trump reportedly told Musk that if elected, one of his first moves would be to "close the Department of Education and return education to the states." "Not every state will excel. Of the 50 states, I bet 35 will excel," Trump said.

When talking about the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the US-EU relationship, Trump said that "if I were in office, the Russia-Ukraine conflict would not have happened" and that "the EU has taken a lot of advantage of the United States in trade." Trump did not mention cutting aid to Ukraine, but still compared the amount of aid the United States and the EU gave to Ukraine. Trump told Musk: "Why does the United States pay much more to defend Europe than Europe pays? It doesn't make sense. It's not fair, and it's a problem that should be solved."

The Hill analyzed that although Trump repeated many of his previous remarks, he also successfully focused the conversation on key issues such as inflation, while avoiding making some inflammatory and controversial remarks.

However, the latest poll jointly released by the Financial Times and the University of Michigan shows that voters trust Harris more than Trump on economic issues. Before Biden withdrew from the campaign, the same survey data released in July showed that 35% of registered voters said they trusted Biden more in dealing with economic issues, while 41% of registered voters supported Trump. After Harris succeeded Biden as the Democratic presidential candidate, 42% of respondents said that no matter what they thought of Harris, they trusted her more to handle economic issues, while Trump's trust rating remained unchanged compared to last month.

Musk's change of stance draws attention after being at odds with Trump

NBC analyzed that the interview showed that after several years of ups and downs in their relationship, Trump and Musk seemed to have reached a reconciliation.

Earlier, Musk revealed in an interview with the media that he had waited in line for six hours to shake hands with former President Obama. In 2017, Musk became one of the first members to withdraw from the White House Business Council due to differences with Trump over climate change policies. In the primary stage of this election, Musk also supported Trump's rival, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, inviting him to be interviewed and promote his presidential campaign.

Trump and Musk have also had several spats. Musk said in 2022 that "Trump is too old to be president" and hoped to see him "hang up his hat and drive off into the sunset." In response, Trump hit back on his social platform Truth Social: "When Musk came to the White House and asked me for help... and told me he was a big Trump fan and a Republican, I could have said 'get down on your knees and beg,' and he would have done it."

But with less than 100 days to go before the 2024 election, the relationship between Trump and Musk has improved significantly. According to a previous report by the Global Times, after the assassination attempt on Trump, Musk immediately posted on social media that he fully supports Trump. On July 20, Trump mentioned Musk during a speech at a campaign rally in Michigan and said that he "has always maintained a good relationship with Musk." Reference News quoted the U.S. Fortune magazine website as reporting on July 24 that although Musk has refuted the rumor of "contributing $45 million a month to help Trump's election", he admitted that a new super political action committee has been established to fund the Republican candidate.

According to media observations, in the interview on August 12, Musk seemed to be trying to get a job in the Trump administration. He said that if Trump is elected, he would be willing to play a role in his administration to help cut federal spending. "I think it would be great to set up a government efficiency committee to focus on controlling government spending. This would ensure that taxpayers' hard-earned money is spent wisely. If it is really established, I am willing to help," Musk said. Trump responded that he would be "very happy" if Musk was involved.

As early as May this year, media reported that as their relationship "warmed up", Trump and Musk had discussed that Musk might serve as an advisor if he won a second term.

Some analysts believe that the Biden administration's alienated attitude towards Musk and his company Tesla is one of the main reasons why Musk turned to Trump. Previously, Musk opposed the establishment of a union for Tesla workers, which aroused strong dissatisfaction from the United Auto Workers (UAW). People familiar with the matter said that the United Auto Workers had pressured the White House to keep its distance from Musk. In 2021, the White House held an electric vehicle summit and invited major American automakers such as General Motors, but Tesla, one of the world's major electric vehicle manufacturers, was not invited. During Biden's administration, Musk's company also faced multiple investigations by the federal government, including the employment practices of his company, the Twitter acquisition, and allegations related to Tesla's autopilot function. In November 2023, Musk said in an interview with the New York Times that he "would not vote for Biden again," but did not state his support for Trump.

Some analysts from Wall Street also believe that although Trump’s election will have a "negative impact" on the entire electric vehicle industry, it is a potential positive for Tesla because Trump proposes to impose tariffs on foreign goods and promises to prevent foreign electric vehicle manufacturers from entering the US market.

In an interview on the 12th, Trump also softened his attitude and said that Tesla's electric cars are great, but said that this does not mean that everyone should own an electric car.