Elon Musk appeared to take a page straight from Donald Trump’s playbook when it came to being called out in a face-to-face, on-camera interview.
The world’s first trillionaire sat for an interview with The Economist, where editor-in-chief Zanny Minton Beddoes held NO punches, asking Musk straight to his face about his support of far-right, fringe groups, leading the Tesla thief straight into an emotional meltdown.
“You support not just the populist right, but the far right — in fact, very fringe parties in some countries,” Beddoes said to Musk.
“No, I support the normal people. What you call the far right, falsely,” the constantly embattled baby daddy shot back, effectively launching himself into what can only be described as a mantrum.
“Here are the principles, and tell me, which of these sound terrible. That we should have secure borders? That we should have safe cities? That we should have sensible spending? Which of those three are far-right fringe? And I would just like to just admonish you and the media for the absurd characterization of the far right. It is false and misleading and nonsense!” Musk shouted before viciously adding, “Please keep this part in. Don’t cut this part,” as he shot a *look* at the camera.
Beddoes assured him, “We’ll keep all of it in,” before continuing to pick and prod at Musk’s fraying edges, taking him to task for his claims that “civil war is inevitable” and violent crime is rampant and out of control in Britain.
“London is a much safer city than any city in the United States,” she said. “You have painted — and because you have so many followers, so many Americans believe it — a kind of view that Europe and the UK are kind of, you know, ‘overrun with terrifying Muslim immigrants, there’s rape on every corner, there’s a sort of civilizational destruction.'”
Musk only grew more agitated, firing back, “I haven’t said any of those things. If you have a large and growing, rapidly growing, group of people whose beliefs are antithetical to Western beliefs, at some point there will be a reckoning. They will try to implement their views, and those who oppose it will oppose it. And that’s what you call civil war. And obviously, this is the trend.”
Beddoes went in for the kill shot: “People say that you’re a racist.”
Musk responded with the racists’ holy grail of comebacks: “My partner is, she’s half Indian, and I have four children with her. One of them was named after a famous Indian physicist. So, I would say I’m not racist. And also, if you look at the people that are employed at my companies, we have senior executives of all races. I don’t think there’s any racism there.”
The equivalent of “I CAN’T be racist. I have a Black friend!”
“You anti-Muslim?” Beddoes dug in.
“If people are coming to a country with antithetical views, I am against that. I’m against rape and murder. I’m against the imposition of rules and laws that are contrary to what we’ve come to accept in the West. And I think it’s a crying shame that the sort of traditional media like you don’t recognize this.”
Someone give this woman an award or five.