Elon Musk returned to the White House on Tuesday (Wednesday AEDT) in a sign that tensions between President Donald Trump and the world’s richest man have thawed since a fierce split over deficit spending earlier this year fractured their once-cozy relationship.
Musk was invited as a guest for a gala, candle-light dinner to honour Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, one of many business titans invited including Tim Cook, David Ellison, Marc Benioff, Bill Ackman and Jensen Huang.
Others in the room included Pfizer boss Albert Bourla and Citigroup’s Jane Fraser, as was Fifa president Gianni Infantino and Portuguese footballer Cristiano Ronaldo, who plays for a Saudi team. Republican political leaders including Vice President J.D. Vance and House Speaker Mike Johnson were also at the event.
Representatives from the crypto world were also among the diners, including Coinbase chief executive Brian Armstrong, Robinhood co-founder Vlad Tenev and Crypto.com CEO Kris Marszalek.
Musk’s political influence has waned since reaching its apex with Trump earlier this year, when his Department of Government Efficiency served as the administration’s cost-cutting enforcer. He had been the largest single financial contributor in the 2024 election, with almost all of his spending supporting Trump.
His months-long political foray damaged the Tesla brand, with consumers associating the cars with Musk’s right-wing politics and investors worried that his time in Washington was distracting him from continuing to innovate.
Musk left the White House in May and soon became embroiled in a public falling-out with Trump over the president’s budget-busting tax-cut bill.
Musk himself appeared soured by his experience in politics. He later threatened to create a third party to challenge the Democratic and Republican “duopoly”, and told Bloomberg that he had “done enough” in contributing to Republican candidates. Several Republicans, notably including Vance, have since worked to find ways to bring Musk back into the GOP fold.
Tesla’s board chairwoman, Robyn Denholm, has said Musk has wide latitude on future electoral engagement as long as he meets the performance targets tied to his $US1 trillion ($1.5 trillion) compensation package.
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