Elon Musk dismisses claims of 'President Musk': Key points from joint interview with Donald Trump

Elon Musk, in an unprecedented joint interview alongside US President Donald Trump on Tuesday (Feb 18), dismissed reports of his growing influence in the Trump 2.0 administration and said he only views his role as facilitating the Republican leader's agenda.

The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) chief, who donned a "Tech Support" T-shirt for the interview brushed aside the criticism that he was acting as "President Musk" and said: Trump "is the elected representative of the people, so it's representing the will of the people."

Here are some of the other striking things the two men said during their noteworthy appearance on The Sean Hannity Show on Fox News.

Replying to a question about the media's alleged attempts to "divorce" Trump and Musk, the contentious US president claimed that despite doing the "greatest things," he gets "98 per cent bad publicity".

Naming and shaming multiple news outlets, including MSNBC, CNN, PBS, AP and CBS, Trump said that he used to think that the media was good at painting him as the bad guy but that "They're actually bad at it, because if they were good at it, I'd never be president because I — I think nobody in history has ever gotten more bad publicity than me."

"It's, like, the craziest thing," he remarked, adding "But you know what I have learned...The people are smart. They get it." 

Portraying himself merely as the executor of Trump's orders, Musk said: "One of the biggest functions of the DOGE team is just making sure that the presidential executive orders are actually carried out."

He also pointed out that "this is a very important thing, because the president is the elected representative of the people, so he's representing the will of the people."

"And if the bureaucracy is fighting the will of the people and preventing the president from implementing what the people want, then what we live in is a bureaucracy and not a democracy," he added.

The recent $10 million settlement paid by Musk's X (formerly Twitter) was also discussed. Trump noted that he had "sued from long before he (Musk) had it.

"I mean, they really did a number on me, you know.  And I sued, and they had to pay.  You know, they paid $10 million settlement."

When asked if he was okay with footing the billions in settlement, the X CEO said, "I mean, I left it up to the lawyers and, you know, the team running Twitter. So, I said, 'You guys do what you think is the right — makes sense'."

The US president who was once banned from Twitter then joked: "I was looking to get much more money than that," and that he gave Musk a "big discount".