Trump-Musk interview: Mocking climate change to mass deportations. Details

In his interview with Tesla owner Elon Musk, former president Donald Trump unveiled a bold new proposal, announcing what he called the largest mass deportation effort in US history

Elon Musk’s highly anticipated interview with former President Donald Trump got underway after a 40-minute delay caused by technical glitches on X’s Spaces platform. Originally scheduled to start at 8 pm EDT, the interview was delayed due to what Musk later described as a significant denial-of-service (DDoS) attack on the platform. 

A DDoS attack, which is a federal criminal offence, involves overwhelming a website with excessive data to render it inaccessible. Musk mentioned this issue 18 minutes into the delayed interview, posting on X that the platform was experiencing what he called a “massive” DDoS attack.

X hits technical snag

Before the interview, outage tracker Downdetector reported a surge in user complaints about X being inaccessible, starting even before the interview was scheduled to begin. However, it was not immediately clear whether this was indeed the result of a malicious attack, as Musk suggested. 

Later, as the interview finally commenced, Musk reiterated that the delay was caused by a “massive distributed denial of service attack (DDoS)” on X servers. He went on to imply that the attack could be seen as evidence of substantial opposition to the idea of people simply listening to what President Trump had to say. Musk also drew a parallel to similar technical difficulties encountered during his May 2023 interview with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis on X Spaces, which he had attributed at the time to X’s servers being overwhelmed by the sheer volume of traffic.

Despite the initial technical problems, the Trump-Musk interview managed to attract over a million listeners from across the globe. Trump opened the conversation by congratulating Musk, remarking, “You broke records, you silence voices.” He continued with, “Congratulations for breaking every record in the book,” emphasising the significance of the event despite the earlier glitches.

Trump on his assassination attempt

Musk steered the conversation to the recent assassination attempt on Trump during a rally in Pennsylvania. When asked about the incident, Trump candidly spoke about the experience, reflecting on the seriousness of the situation. “I didn’t know I had that much blood,” he joked, adding that the outcome was the “best alternative you could think about” given that he wasn’t more severely injured. 

Trump further shared that the experience had deepened his faith, saying, “I’m a believer, now. I’m more of a believer in God, I think,” following the attack. He also suggested that his stance on immigration may have made him a target. Trump went on to announce that he plans to return to Butler, Pennsylvania, in October, where he survived the assassination attempt on July 13. 

During the discussion, Musk suggested lightheartedly that the charts Trump was looking at just moments before the gunfire may have saved his life by prompting him to adjust his position. In response, Trump humorously quipped, “Illegal immigration saved my life,” referencing both the assassination attempt and the topic he was discussing when the shots rang out.