Jen Psaki Taunts Trump Over President Musk Magazine Cover: ‘I’m Just Gonna Leave That Up There!’
MSNBC host and Biden administration alum Jen Psaki taunted President Donald Trump over a Time Magazine cover featuring Elon Musk at the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office — an image widely seen as a shot at Trump.
In fact, Trump himself seemed to take it that way when he got snippy at a photo op after he learned about the cover from a reporter, cracking “Is Time Magazine still in business? I didn’t even know that.”
Trump was the magazine’s most recent Person of the Year and celebrated that cover with a speech in front of a giant image of the magazine just a matter of weeks ago.
On Sunday’s edition of MSNBC’s Inside With Jen Psaki, the host relished that cover as she delivered a show-opening commentary on Musk’s wild joyride through government, pointedly lingering over the image:
JEN PSAKI: OK, I kind of think that, I mean, to some degree, what we are seeing from Donald Trump right now is sort of what we expected, the strange obsessions, and the constant bluster, and the wild pronouncements.
None of that is anything really that new. There was also the talk about taking over Greenland and Canada and the Panama Canal. There was the short-lived trade war, with nothing to show for it. There was the decision just yesterday to strip security clearances from people he doesn’t like.
There was the third-person announcement that he’s appointing himself chairman of the Kennedy Center. And I could go on and on and on, but I’m not going to. The point is, if you have been following Donald Trump for the last decade — and many of you, I know, have been — this is all very much what you might expect from a Trump 2.0.
And I guess this continuation of the Trump show is on some level what a slight majority of the American people may have voted for? I don’t know.
But what you may not have bargained for, what they may not have bargained for, and I certainly didn’t, is what I’m going to call Musk 1.0.
I actually think it’s safe to say people were not prepared for the way Trump has basically ceded his power. I mean, there’s a reason “TIME” magazine’s latest cover shows Musk sitting in the Oval Office behind the Resolute Desk.
And I’m just going to leave that up there for a second, because why not?
And because, over the past few weeks, Elon Musk has elbowed his way into nearly every corner of the government, shuttering agencies, firing employees, gaining access to the sensitive personal data belonging to millions of Americans.
And in an interview that’s going to air later today, Trump said he’s not done yet.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
DONALD TRUMP: I’m going to tell him very soon, like maybe in 24 hours, to go check the Department of Education. He’s going to find the same thing. Then I’m going to go to the military. Let’s check the military. We’re going to find billions, hundreds of billions of dollars of fraud and abuse.
And the people elected me on that.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
PSAKI: I mean, did they really? Did the American people really elect you to let Elon Musk do what he’s doing?
Because it turns out the American people don’t love it. A new poll out just this morning shows that just 23 percent of all Americans say they want Musk to have a lot of influence over government operations and spending. And, boy, does he seem to have a lot of influence.
Watch above via MSNBC’s Inside With Jen Psaki.
