Musk vs. Trump (and beyond). The Loudest Feuds of the Worlds Richest Man

Conflicts are a usual affair for Musk. Before befriending and then feuding with Trump, he claimed Joe Biden “talks to the American public like they’re idiots” and “can’t even read speeches properly, even with a teleprompter,” also calling him a “puppet made from a wet sock.” But Musk’s criticism isn’t limited to presidents.

PayPal

This is one of the most painful stories for Musk. In 1999, Musk sold the startup he founded, Zip2, and became a multimillionaire. He bought a condominium, a McLaren F1 car, an L39 airplane, and invested in the startup X.com, which dealt with online payments. A year later, X.com merged with PayPal (actually, Confinity was the company’s name at the time).

The legendary investor Peter Thiel stepped down in favor of Musk as CEO of the merged company. But it turned out Musk had his own ideas on how to run the business, was not very cooperative, and had a sharp tongue. Disputes arose between Elon and the PayPal founders. The conflict escalated into a real war when Musk tried to replace the Unix operating system with Microsoft products. This is a very sensitive topic for programmers, akin to rival football fan clubs.

In 2000, Musk took his first break in years and flew to Australia for a honeymoon. As soon as he was out of mobile coverage, the board of directors convened urgently, fired him, and reinstated Thiel as CEO. Musk had preferred working over resting even before, and after this incident, he became even more disillusioned with the idea of vacations.

However, Musk came out of this story richer than before. He retained PayPal shares and, after a forced buyout a few years later, earned $180 million from them. With this money, he founded SpaceX. He also bought the X.com domain back from PayPal in 2017 and used it to rename Twitter.

First and Third Wives

Musk first married Justine Wilson in 2000. It quickly became clear that Musk’s work came first, and his wife was a secondary priority. After their first child died in 2002 at 10 weeks old from sudden infant death syndrome, Musk threw himself even deeper into work to cope. Later they had five children, but the quarrels didn’t stop. Justine recalled throwing at him during one argument: “I’m your wife, not your subordinate!” Musk retorted: “I would have fired an employee like that long ago!” In 2008, Musk gave an ultimatum: either his wife fixed their relationship on her own or they’d divorce. The next day, he filed for divorce. Justine continued to describe what a bad husband Musk was in her blog and numerous interviews.

Her stories didn’t stop British actress Talulah Riley from marrying Musk just six weeks after he filed for divorce. Musk’s second marriage proved he could avoid public scandals. They quietly divorced two years later. Musk wrote on Twitter: “I will love you forever. One day you’ll make someone very happy.”

But while the divorce was ongoing, Musk and Talulah reconciled and remarried in 2013. A year and a half later, Musk filed for divorce again, then withdrew the petition. In 2016, Talulah finalized the divorce. Musk said they had lived apart for six months to see if feelings would reignite: “Unfortunately, they didn’t. I still love her, but I’m not in love with her.” The couple remained on friendly terms. Talulah’s name surfaced during Musk’s Twitter acquisition trial. It turned out

she had messaged Musk urging him to buy a messenger app and shut it down, calling Twitter “a scourge of modern life.”

In 2018, Musk began a relationship with singer Grimes (real name Claire Elise Boucher). Their relationship was also turbulent. The couple would unfollow and then follow each other on social media repeatedly. They never married but had three children. In October 2023, Grimes filed a lawsuit accusing Musk of denying her access to their youngest son, Techno “Tau” Mechanicus. Musk accused Grimes of greed in response. She insisted the case be heard in California, where she recently moved, rather than Texas. Musk explained the reason simply: Texas courts set much lower child support payments than California. Ultimately, the trial took place in Texas in August 2024.

Twitter and Its Advertisers

Musk offered to buy Twitter on April 14, 2022, and two weeks later, the $44 billion deal was finalized. But by May, Musk accused Twitter’s management of lying about the business’s state and tried to cancel the deal, claiming the company had far more fake accounts and bots than reported. At one point,

Musk responded to Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal with a poop emoji.

Nevertheless, he had to complete the purchase. But a new problem arose. Major advertisers were scared off by Musk’s antisemitic tweets and started leaving the platform. Musk fired back with many insulting remarks. For example, at the 2023 DealBook conference, he complained about being blackmailed with advertising and told advertisers to “go make love to themselves.” He clarified that his comments were also directed at Disney CEO Bob Iger. Over time, tensions eased, and advertisers returned to X (formerly Twitter).

Mark Zuckerberg

You can find many memes online about a fight between Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg and even videos of their no-rules battle. In reality, it never went beyond a challenge; the videos were AI-generated, which was one of the reasons for their conflict.

One theory is that the feud between Musk and Zuckerberg began in September 2016. At that time, a SpaceX rocket exploded during testing, destroying Zuckerberg’s AMOS-6 satellite. It was supposed to be the first in Facebook’s project to connect developing countries to the internet. Zuckerberg posted on Facebook how deeply disappointed he was by the accident. Musk seemed hurt by this. Two years later, he irritably commented to the media on the incident:

“Yes, I’m guilty of being an idiot. As compensation, we gave [Zuckerberg] a free launch, and I think their [satellite] was insured.”

Musk enthusiastically supported the #deletefacebook campaign in 2018. He was immediately reminded that both SpaceX and Tesla had accounts on the network. Musk feigned surprise, and the accounts soon disappeared. After the Capitol riots in 2021, Musk hinted in tweets that Facebook played an organizing role, then posted a meme accusing Facebook of spying on users.

Musk and Zuckerberg have sparred on hot topics more than once. In April 2020, at Tesla’s annual report presentation, Musk expressed outrage at the COVID-19 lockdown:

“It violates people’s freedom in the most horrible and wrong way. People didn’t come to America and build this country for this. What the hell?”

Zuckerberg, at Facebook’s report presentation, countered that easing lockdowns “will surely lead to new infection outbreaks and, worse, negative consequences for people’s health and the economy.” Musk repeatedly called lockdown supporters “fascists,” while Zuckerberg defended them.

Another point of confrontation was artificial intelligence. Zuckerberg actively implemented AI in Facebook.

Musk, on the other hand, warned AI is dangerous for humanity, while simultaneously developing his own AI projects

— presumably viewing their products as “benevolent” artificial intelligence.

Their conflict peaked in 2023 when Twitter users joked and warned Musk to be careful with Zuckerberg, who was learning jiu-jitsu! Musk replied he was ready to fight Zuckerberg in a cage (i.e., agreed to an MMA no-rules fight). Facebook’s founder accepted the challenge and asked where the fight would take place. It was scheduled for August 26 but, to fans’ disappointment, never happened—allegedly due to a formal reason. Musk insisted on fighting either in the Roman Colosseum arena or at Zuckerberg’s home, while Zuckerberg only agreed to a professional UFC venue.

OpenAI

In 2015, Elon Musk and Sam Altman founded the non-profit OpenAI to develop artificial intelligence. Initially, OpenAI shared an office with Musk’s startup Neuralink, which was working on brain implants. Musk insisted OpenAI set an ambitious goal to raise $1 billion in investments. Altman planned to raise ten times less. Musk donated $44 million to OpenAI between 2016 and 2017 and paid the startup’s office rent for a long time.

The partners disagreed on whether OpenAI should remain non-profit or become a full-fledged business. The latter would allow attracting investments from industry giants like Microsoft. Musk opposed this. He claimed a non-profit fund would develop AI gradually and cautiously, while a commercial race would cause humanity to lose control over AI and deeply regret it later.

But Musk was also concerned about his personal control over AI development. At one point, he insisted OpenAI become part of Tesla. The partners strongly disliked this idea, and in 2018 Musk resigned as co-chairman of OpenAI. It was handled amicably: all employees were gathered, and Musk was praised. But at one point, an employee asked an awkward question: wasn’t Tesla’s AI project the very commercial race Musk feared? Musk called the employee an idiot and left the event. After that, Musk tried to lure OpenAI employees to Tesla, which caused irritation among his former partners.

OpenAI did receive Microsoft funding but through a specially created commercial entity with several restrictions. In November 2022, it launched the ChatGPT chatbot, which sparked a wave of criticism from Musk. He mocked how the non-profit project morphed into a business making billions from Microsoft. Musk moved from words to action and sued OpenAI over project commercialization. The verdict won’t come before next year.

After buying Twitter, Musk cut OpenAI off from messenger data used to train AI. Then he founded his own AI project — xAI, and now its chatbot Grok competes with ChatGPT.

Senator Elizabeth Warren

In June 2021, Senator Elizabeth Warren reposted a ProPublica investigative report on Twitter about the tax returns of the richest Americans. She especially noted that Musk paid no income tax in 2018. When Time magazine named Musk Person of the Year, Warren spoke out, calling for a wealth tax. Musk responded with a tweet:

“You remind me of childhood when my friend’s mean mom yelled at everyone for no reason.”

He also called Warren “Senator Karen.” This is a derogatory slang term South Africans (Musk grew up in South Africa) use to describe an overly demanding and confrontational white woman.

The Farting Unicorn Creator

In February 2017, Musk posted a photo on Twitter of “possibly my favorite mug.” It featured a cartoon unicorn farting to charge an electric car. The drawing was by artist Tom Edwards from Colorado, and the other side of the mug read: “Electric cars are good for the environment because electricity comes from a magic wand.” This was sarcasm: Edwards wanted to remind people that electricity doesn’t come from thin air and its production is no less toxic than internal combustion engine emissions.

Musk didn’t recognize the irony. Soon Edwards discovered that the unicorn image appeared on Tesla’s touchscreens as an app icon and was used on the company’s Christmas cards. Edwards sued for intellectual property theft. Musk responded with tweets calling it ridiculous and saying the artist should be happy to get attention. A month later, Musk and Edwards settled, but the terms were not disclosed.

Diver Vernon Unsworth

In 2018, Musk called a man he didn’t know a “pedo.” This concerned the rescue of 12 Thai boys and their football coach from a flooded cave. Musk offered to build a mini-submarine to evacuate them. British diver Vernon Unsworth participated in the rescue operation. When CNN asked about the submarine, Unsworth called it a PR stunt. The device was actually a capsule converted from a Falcon 9 rocket body, meant to be manually carried by divers. The child would lie inside for hours as if in a coffin while being transported to the exit. It was about 1.5 meters long with a diameter nearly as narrow as the tightest cave passages. It risked getting stuck for good on the way. At the end of his tirade, Unsworth said

Musk could “stick his submarine where it hurts.”

Before the CNN report, Musk probably hadn’t heard of Unsworth. That didn’t stop him from tweeting that Unsworth was a “pedo.” Someone in the comments objected that such insults were unacceptable. Musk offered to bet a dollar it was true. The story seemed to end with Musk deleting his tweet and apologizing.

But a month later, Musk replied in Twitter comments to a user who remembered the incident: “Don’t you find it strange that [Unsworth] hasn’t sued me? He was offered a free lawyer.” BuzzFeed reporter sent Musk a request for comment and got a written reply. Musk stated he truly considered Unsworth a “child molester” and added: “I hope he damn well sues me.” At the start of the letter, Musk claimed his words were not a slip-up. BuzzFeed published the full text. Later in court, Musk admitted calling himself a “damn idiot” for this.

Unsworth did sue Musk for defamation. Musk’s main defense was that

in his native South Africa, “pedoguy” means not “pedophile” but “ugly old man.”

In December 2019, the jury acquitted Musk.

Jeff Bezos

Space was the cause of conflict between the two entrepreneurs. Bezos founded Blue Origin in 2000, Musk founded SpaceX a bit later in 2002. A few years later, they met for dinner but didn’t become friends. Musk publicly regretted giving Bezos good advice that Bezos ignored. Then Musk called Bezos a poacher, accusing him of poaching employees. In 2013, they clashed over NASA’s right to use launch pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center (the launch site of Apollo’s first Moon mission). NASA chose Musk. But Bezos immediately patented the idea of launching rockets from ships. Musk was only planning sea spaceports and would have had to pay Bezos for every launch. Their companies sued each other, with

SpaceX even referencing the 1959 Soviet film “The Sky Calls,” which showed a sea rocket launch.

Eventually, Blue Origin had to significantly revise its patent.

The exchange of barbs about space became routine for Musk and Bezos. In 2015, SpaceX landed the suborbital Falcon booster on a ship for the first time. Bezos ironically congratulated Musk “on joining the club.” The next year, a BBC journalist asked Musk about Bezos’s space programs. Musk replied puzzled, “Which Jeff?”

Bezos mocks Musk’s Mars program on social media: the trip takes years, communication delays range from 3 to 24 minutes (depending on planetary positions), living on Everest is more comfortable than Mars, and the whole project seems like a fantasy. Musk mocks Bezos’s lunar program in return. For example, he renamed Bezos’s lunar module from Blue Moon to the obscene Blue Balls. He claims

Blue Origin is too slow and Bezos will die before succeeding.

Musk also accuses Bezos of plagiarism and copying. With reason: in 2019, Bezos planned to launch 3,236 satellites to cover the Earth with internet (Musk announced Starlink a year earlier), and in 2020 Amazon bought the self-driving taxi startup Zoox (Tesla was already developing robot taxis).

Musk’s and Bezos’s companies have sued each other multiple times. When Bezos announced he was leaving Amazon in 2021 to focus on space projects, Musk teased: “He’s doing it to dedicate himself to suing SpaceX.” But Bezos often ignores Musk’s jabs, avoiding personal confrontation. Instead, Bezos’s companies respond. For example, Amazon sent The Verge a 13-page list of all lawsuits SpaceX filed against it since 2004 to prove Musk is the main troublemaker. Amazon also filed a complaint with the U.S. Federal Communications Commission claiming “SpaceX’s and other Musk-led companies’ behavior clearly shows they believe rules are for others, and those who insist on compliance <...> become targets of ridicule and personal attacks.”

Roberto Escobar, Brother of the Mobster

Musk had a brief spat in 2019 with Roberto Escobar, brother of the late Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar. A year earlier, Musk’s company The Boring Company planned to sell flamethrowers for just $500 to ordinary citizens.

They’d be useful in a zombie apocalypse and also for roasting marshmallows.

The batch of 20,000 sold out in four days.

Roberto Escobar accused Musk of stealing the idea. Allegedly, one of Musk’s employees visited the Escobar estate and heard the idea of a flamethrower from the owner. Roberto planned to entertain guests by burning money in front of them. Escobar Inc did release its own flamethrower after Musk, priced the same at $500. But people were reluctant to buy it even after the price was halved. Then Escobar told TMZ that Musk stole his idea and demanded $100 million in cash or Tesla shares.

Musk replied with a short tweet: “This is not a flamethrower, Mr. Escobar.” This was a wordplay: Musk’s weapon was named Not-A-Flamethrower. He then added that if anyone stole the idea, it was the creators of the Star Wars parody “Spaceballs” from 1987. That was the end of it.

U.S. Treasury Secretary

At a White House farewell ceremony, Elon Musk appeared with a black eye. He told reporters he was playing with his five-year-old son X Æ A-Xii and said, “Now hit me in the face,” and the child did.

In reality, Musk quarreled and then fought with Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent right at the White House, claims former Trump advisor Steve Bannon. Allegedly, the argument started with accusations that Musk promised to save a trillion dollars but only cut expenses by about $100 billion. Bannon insists Musk threw the first punch but was met with strong resistance.

Elon Musk’s Father

The billionaire’s father, Errol Musk, recently flew to Moscow for the “Future Forum 2050.”

His parents divorced when Elon was eight. Musk’s mother recalled that Errol abused her — and once five-year-old Elon even tried to fight his father to protect his mother from beatings. At age 10, Elon and his brother moved to live with their father, persuaded by their grandmother. Much later, Musk called this decision “not a very good idea,” saying his father “is very good at making people miserable.”

Musk’s sister said Errol liked giving long lectures about how much of a loser and pathetic person his children were. When he learned his father married his own stepdaughter, Musk angrily called him a “spawn of hell.”

Main photo: Elon Musk and Argentine President Javier Milei speaking at the 2025 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC). National Harbor, Maryland, February 20, 2025. Photo: Gage Skidmore from Surprise, AZ / CC BY-SA 2.0