Politics
Elon Musk fades into the background
Elon Musk and Donald Trump were the main characters on the Internet and across Washington day after day. Then the world’s richest man started to fade away.
On Truth Social, where Trump is known for sharing his unfiltered thoughts, the president used to mention Musk every few days but now has not posted about him in more than a month. Trump’s fundraising operation has largely ceased sending emails that name-check the Tesla CEO. The billionaire’s name, once a staple of White House briefings, now hardly gets mentioned at all. Even members of Congress have essentially dropped him from their newsletters.
It’s a remarkable change for the man who was seemingly everywhere in the early days of the second Trump administration. Musk was in the Oval Office, in Cabinet meetings and on Air Force One. He was at inauguration, then in the House gallery for Trump’s first address to Congress, where Trump praised his hard work. He posed with the president and a row of Teslas on the White House lawn.
But Musk’s highly visible presence in Washington has ended, a Blue Light News analysis found. In Trump’s rapidly evolving second presidency, Musk’s monopoly on political discourse, news coverage and social media seems to have broken — driven in part by how Trump and Republicans have all but stopped talking about him.
“I miss him,” said Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.).
Musk’s shrinking presence could have political benefits for the GOP. Public polling has revealed him to be increasingly unpopular — far more so than Trump. Early last month, Republicans also lost a major Wisconsin judicial race where Musk had become both a major funder and a campaign issue. And in Washington, the cost-slashing efforts of Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency have continued, but have taken a political back seat to tariffs and the budget fight.
Republicans still speak favorably of Musk when asked about him. And they of course want his massive wealth, army of supporters, and online influence machine backing them in future elections. But while Kennedy argued that Musk stepping back won’t “make any difference one way or the other” for the midterms, others are starting to say the best way for the tech CEO to help the party might not be on the campaign trail ahead of 2026.
“Those polls on favorability basically tell you Elon’s doing a great job when he’s on the inside,” said David McIntosh, CEO of the conservative Club for Growth. “And hopefully he stays a long time to do that, but doesn’t take on this role of a campaign surrogate.”
That could complicate Democrats’ efforts to use Musk as a political foil. They’ve spent months honing strategies, including in the Wisconsin race, to tie the unpopular billionaire to their Republican opponents in battleground contests across the country.
But the Tesla CEO, who has an enormous following on his social media platform X, is unlikely to completely disappear — and Democrats say they can still use him as a boogeyman. Musk has become such a potent villain on the left that Democrats still expect to invoke him ahead of competitive elections this year in Virginia and New Jersey, as well as in next year’s midterms. And while Republicans are less inclined to put him at the forefront, they’re also not fully backing away from him.
“Ultimately, the issue here was never about Elon Musk, it was about Elon Musk-ism,” said Jesse Ferguson, a Democratic strategist. “He wrote their playbook, and it’s not about theoretical blame, it’s about real-world damage that he and Trump have caused that will be litigated all through the midterms.”
The Trump administration’s shift away from Musk has been dramatic online. In February and March, Trump posted about the Tesla CEO an average of roughly four times per week; since the beginning of April, the president hasn’t mentioned Musk once on Truth Social.
Asked about Trump’s declining mentions of Musk, and whether the tech CEO was a political liability, the White House didn’t mention Musk directly.
“The mission of DOGE — to cut waste, fraud, and abuse — will surely continue. DOGE employees who onboarded at their respective agencies will continue to work with President Trump’s cabinet to make our government more efficient,” Trump press secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement.
It’s not just Trump. The president’s top advisers, as well as official White House accounts, have also largely stopped posting photos and content that mentions Musk.
Trump is also no longer using Musk’s name to bring in money. In February, his fundraising operation invoked Musk in emails to online supporters on a near-daily basis — a sign that the Tesla CEO was red meat for drumming up donations with the Trump-loving online base. (“I love Elon Musk! The media wants to drive us apart, and it’s not working. He’s great,” read part of one fundraising message, sent February 27.)
But mentions of Musk in fundraising appeals abruptly stopped in early March. Since then, Trump has sent only one fundraising message mentioning Musk — a May email touting a “Gulf of America” hat that the Tesla CEO tried on.
As Musk’s role in the White House has publicly faded, he’s generating less Google search traffic and getting mentioned in the news less. It’s a far cry from the attention he was receiving as a central political figure on the campaign trail and then as the head of the Trump administration’s efforts to slash the federal government.
Some Republicans have come to see Musk as politically toxic, which Democrats have been trying to leverage. First, there’s the polling: voters tend to view Musk far less favorably than Trump. Compared to a few months ago, the Tesla CEO’s approval rating has dropped across most groups, including independents and voters without college degrees.
Polling from Navigator Research earlier this spring found that DOGE’s work becomes less popular when tied to Musk, and polling from Data for Progress in late April found most voters wanted Musk out of government at the end of his 130-day period as a special employee that’s set to expire at the end of in May — or even sooner.
“The public supported the effort to end wasteful Washington spending, but they did not support the way that it was done,” said GOP pollster Frank Luntz. “His mission to cut the waste from Washington was certainly helpful, but the language he used wasn’t.”
Sen. Jim Justice (R-W.V.), a top Trump ally, said Musk is a “patriot” and that “he’s really trying to give up his time and do a lot of good.” But he acknowledged that the DOGE chief has ruffled feathers.
“We got too close to the fence. We mowed too far,” he said. “We just adjust. That’s the process that’s going on.”
In Wisconsin, Democrats put Musk at the forefront of the state Supreme Court election in April, aided by the fact that the Tesla CEO was a major donor backing the conservative candidate and showed up to campaign in the state. The race became a referendum on not just the broader Trump administration but on Musk specifically. And Judge Susan Crawford — the liberal candidate who ran an ad accusing Musk of trying to “buy” a seat on the court — won by 10 points in a state Trump had narrowly carried last November.
“He’s finished, done, gone. He polls terrible. People hate him,” said a GOP operative who was granted anonymity to speak frankly. “He’d go to Wisconsin thinking he can buy people’s votes, wear the cheese hat, act like a 9-year-old. … It doesn’t work. It’s offensive to people.”
In addition to potential political concerns, part of Musk’s shift out of the spotlight reflects the rapidly changing issue priorities over the early months of Trump’s presidency. In the first few months, DOGE’s cuts were top of mind. And while those efforts continue, they have also given up some of the spotlight to other Trump initiatives, including his market-rocking tariffs and controversial deportations.
So while Musk’s public profile has declined, that does not mean he lacks access or influence. Just last week, he was among the tech CEOs to join Trump in Saudi Arabia, shaking hands with the nation’s leaders and speaking at an investment forum.
And DOGE’s aggressive cost-cutting efforts, led by a staff Musk brought in, are expected to continue even after he formally leaves his role as a special government employee. Both Republicans and Democrats also widely expect the tech billionaire, who poured $290 million of his own money into the 2024 elections, to continue to be a major political player.
That’s one reason why Democrats say they aren’t fretting. Musk remains a foil for Democrats to highlight, but in the context of Trump and Republicans who have enabled him, said CJ Warnke, spokesperson for House Majority PAC, Democrats’ super PAC for congressional races. The issues that have replaced Musk as a dominating issue in news, such as potential Medicaid cuts and tariffs, are still good for Democrats to run on, he said.
In Wisconsin’s Supreme Court race, several ads backing Crawford focused primarily or entirely on Musk, and for a while Democrats would sometimes mention Musk — but not Trump — on social media and in statements.
The Tesla CEO is still being regularly name-dropped in Democratic congressional candidates’ announcements from Pennsylvania to Illinois and California, in both safe and swing districts. And of the six Democrats running in New Jersey’s June 10 gubernatorial primary, four have named Musk in TV ads.
But recent ads tend to avoid making Musk the main villain. As ads blanket New Jersey in the final weeks of the race, the spots mentioning Musk usually put him side by side with Trump. A few give him glancing mentions or a quick flash on screen — not the main character.
Tennessee GOP Rep. Andy Ogles was ousted by a Republican challenger on Thursday, a blow to President Donald Trump and Speaker Mike Johnson who tried to boost his campaign in the final days.
Former Tennessee Agriculture Commissioner Charlie Hatcher won the GOP primary for the 5th District after outraising Ogles, receiving a late endorsement from GOP Gov. Bill Lee and seeing a flood of outside money on his behalf from a renewable energy super PAC.
Ultimately, that spending, coupled with a newly redrawn district that forced Ogles to reach new voters, helped end his reelection bid. Ogles has also faced a number of controversies since he was first elected in 2022.
He deleted a homophobic social media post that was denounced by members of his own party in June, and he drew severe backlash for another post in which he said “Muslims don’t belong in American society.” In 2024, the FBI searched Ogles’ phone during an investigation into campaign finance records, which came after a watchdog group filed an ethics complaint into his use of campaign funds. And in 2023, he faced scrutiny for false claims about his resume.
Ogles’ loss makes him the second Trump-endorsed candidate to lose a primary this week, after a Michigan House candidate who had the president’s backing fell to a challenger who had already dropped out.
Hatcher will face the Democratic mayor of Columbia, Tennessee, Chaz Molder, in November. Molder has posted strong fundraising hauls, while Hatcher will basically be starting from scratch.
But Republicans redrew the seat to favor Trump by 23 points after the Supreme Court severely limited the Voting Rights Act earlier this year, leaving Hatcher as the front-runner.
HIDALGO, Texas — Bobby Pulido is learning that the bright lights of politics can be even harsher than music superstardom.
For the past several months, the Latin Grammy-winning singer and local megacelebrity has been the subject of a steady stream of national headlines scrutinizing his former professional relationship with a one-time bandmate who was imprisoned on child sex molestation charges. He’s also faced criticism for past social media posts that included racial, sexist and homophobic slurs and comments.
During a recent interview with Blue Light News — after a weeknight meet-and-greet with voters in the same stadium where he performed his final concert in November 2025 — Pulido struck a defensive tone about the scandals that have plagued his campaign.
“I apologize right now,” Pulido said, referring to the social media posts. “I’ll tell you right now, that way you’ll never ask me again. I apologize for everything that I’ve ever joked about that offended anybody. But I can’t continue to revisit every single one.”
Pulido also insisted he did nothing wrong in his working relationship with Frankie Caballero, maintaining he did not know about his former accordionist’s child molestation charges. He expects opponents to “keep dripping, dripping, dripping, dripping” new social media posts.
“I’ve been an open book for 30 years,” he said. “I was on Twitter way before I thought about running for office. They’re gonna keep going to old tweets, and there’s a lot of tweets in there that I’m embarrassed of. There’s jokes that I’ve told that I apologize for, and I’ve owned up to them. I’m like, man, that makes me cringe, and I’ve publicly apologized.”
Pulido is one of House Democrats’ prized battleground recruits and a key part of their plan to flip control of the lower chamber. The first-time candidate is widely known in Texas’ 15th District for his singing career, and he hopes to capitalize on voters’ anti-incumbency angst in his bid against GOP Rep. Monica De La Cruz in a newly redrawn district that President Donald Trump won by 18 points in 2024.
Recent polling shows the race within the margin of error or Pulido leading, thanks in large part to his near-universal name ID. But while voters have shown a strong interest in political outsiders, those outsiders are also untested — and new revelations can swamp news cycles and potentially their chances.
The New York Post first reported in April on Pulido’s past relationship to Caballero, a registered sex offender who was imprisoned for indecent contact with an eight-year-old girl. Pulido told Blue Light News he first learned that Caballero was incarcerated on sex charges from the Post report, and Pulido’s campaign says the singer’s management company cut ties with Caballero after learning about a domestic abuse charge in 2021.
Pulido said he’d asked Caballero why he was in prison. “Transferring illegal aliens. That’s what he told me,” he told Blue Light News. “And I knew he had a lot of substance abuse issues, and he violated a lot of his paroles. Those were the things that he told me.” (Pulido’s campaign told the Texas Tribune in July that Pulido only knew Caballero struggled with addiction.)
In June, Axios reported Caballero performed with Pulido at a middle school benefit concert in 2018, where children were present, after being released from prison. When asked if he regretted having Caballero play there, Pulido said he did — knowing what he knows now.
“Without me knowing, it’s hard for me to say that,” he said. “Me, that I know now, yes. I wish I wouldn’t have taken him there.”
Caballero could not be reached for comment.
Pulido’s past social media posts have also come back to haunt the singer-turned-politician. In Twitter posts between 2013 and 2018, Pulido used homophobic and sexist Spanish-language slurs which translate to “f-g,” “f—-t” and “p—y.” In several other posts, he used the word “prieto,” a term referring to dark-skinned individuals many view as pejorative. The posts were first reported by NBC News and reviewed by Blue Light News. In another 2013 Spanish-language post reviewed by Blue Light News, Pulido joked that Mexican actor Mauricio Islas “isn’t a f-g, respect him. His boyfriend is.”
Islas, whose partner is a woman, did not respond to a request for comment.
Pulido told Blue Light News some of the remarks were made in jest toward personal friends. “That’s how we joke. I would never tell a stranger that,” he said.
He defended his use of the racial term as a cultural misunderstanding. “In our culture, we call each other that. It’s like Black people calling each other the n-word,” he said. “Would somebody that called another Black person the n-word be accused of racism? But they want to come and translate what I said to this guy, which is how we say it and we’re joking, they wanted to make it seem like I’m telling some complete stranger that. That’s not what it is.”
“I’m not making excuses,” Pulido added. “Would you have to apologize to your friend that you joke like that with, that doesn’t have a problem with anything you say? I don’t feel like I should have to apologize to them because they’re my friends.”
This isn’t the first time he’s flashed irritation when asked about his past posts, saying they distract from issues like affordability and immigration that voters care about. Pulido let loose on the New York Post when the paper reached out for comment about some other controversial social media posts. “We’ve been getting the same recycled tabloid nonsense since last October,” he said in a July video posted to his social media channels.
“And for whatever reporter that wants to keep asking,” he said in Spanish, “que no mamen, Kool-Aids. Now go translate that.” The colloquial phrase translates roughly to “don’t be jerks, assholes” or “don’t be stupid, assholes.”
De La Cruz’s campaign hopes to make hay out of the issues. In a statement, James Shook, the representative’s campaign manager, said Pulido is a “product of the corrupt compadre system that looks out for itself and everybody else is expected to look away.”
In press releases, De La Cruz’s campaign has pointed out apparent inconsistencies in Pulido’s statements. They note that Pulido told The Monitor he fired Caballero in 1996, but Caballero appears on two of Pulido’s albums through 1999. In a 2019 podcast, Pulido suggested he got Caballero out of jail; he told Bloomberg this year that was “hyperbolic” and he “misspoke.”
“Bobby Pulido walked a man convicted of molesting an eight-year-old girl onto a middle school event in this community, and hid his sex offender status from parents,” Shook said. “This is someone he toured with for years and is on tape bragging he personally bailed him out of jail. The only question left is why he thought he would get away with it.”
But there are signs that voters have become increasingly desensitized to scandal. A new Blue Light News Poll found a significant share of voters — both Republican and Democrat — say they would stick with their preferred candidate even if they were caught accepting gifts from lobbyists, exploiting tax loopholes or making antisemitic posts. Democrats drew a harsher line when it came to accusations of sexual violence and sexual assault. Voters were not polled on past use of homophobic or gender slurs on social media, or on relationships with sex offenders.
Some of Pulido’s supporters who know his family largely shrug off the headlines.
Esmeralda Knapp, a hairstylist in McAllen, said she will vote for Pulido solely because his uncle, a former county judge, helped secure Knapp’s brother’s release from prison many years ago. Bob Villarreal, a retired teacher in Edinburg, reminisced about the time Pulido’s father, a musician himself, substitute-taught his sixth-grade orchestra class. Maria Dominguez, who runs a wellness club in McAllen, said Pulido is “a good person” because she knows his family: “His family are working people, good people and raised in the valley.”
Villarreal brushed off Pulido’s relationship with Caballero. “It wasn’t Bobby,” he said. “I guess it’s important for some people, but for me, I mean, it’s somebody else.”
“It’s guilt by association,” said Patricia Villarreal, his wife.
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