As the war of words between President Donald Trump and Elon Musk rages, it's sparked a new debate over how decisive the world's richest person was in helping Trump recapture the White House in the 2024 election.The president, speaking with reporters, argued, "I think I would have won" even without Musk's help on the campaign trail last year.Musk, firing back, argued that "without me, Trump would have lost the election."While the once-strong alliance between Trump and Musk rapidly disintegrated on Thursday as the two traded barbs over the president's "big, beautiful" tax cuts and spending bill, the zingers also extended to other topics, including last year's presidential election.MUSK MAY SPEAK WITH TRUMP AIDES IN PUSH TO END FEUD WITH PRESIDENTMusk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, went all in for Trump last summer and autumn.He endorsed the GOP presidential nominee in July right after the assassination attempt against Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania.REPUBLICAN LAWMAKERS STAND FIRM AGAINST MUSK'S KILL THE BILL ASSAULT ON TRUMP'S AGENDAMusk became the top donor of the 2024 election cycle, dishing out nearly $300 million in support of Trump's bid through America PAC, a Trump-aligned super PAC. Much of the money was used for get-out-the-vote efforts and ads in the crucial battleground states as Trump and Kamala Harris faced off for the presidency.Musk concentrated much of his efforts on Pennsylvania.He joined Trump for the first time on the campaign trail at an Oct. 5 rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, then held five town halls in the Keystone State later in October.And Musk set up a war room of sorts in Pittsburgh.Trump, mentioning how Musk campaigned for him in Pennsylvania, pointed to his White House chief of staff, Susie Wiles, who was co-chair of Trump's 2024 campaign.The president noted that "Susie would say I would have won Pennsylvania easily anyway."MUSK'S FISCAL CONSERVATIVE EVOLUTION PUTS HIM AT ODDS WITH TRUMPMusk, apparently watching Trump's comments in real time, quickly fired back on X, which Musk renamed after buying Twitter."Without me, Trump would have lost the election, Dems would control the House and the Republicans would be 51-49 in the Senate," Musk wrote. "Such ingratitude."Veteran Republican strategist John Brabender, who served as a media consultant to the 2024 Trump campaign, told Fox News Digital that "Elon and many others played an important role in helping the president win states all across America.""But the bottom line is theres only one constant and one person who is most responsible, by far, and thats President Trump. Thats who people voted for," Brabender added.Longtime Republican consultant Dave Carney, a veteran of numerous GOP presidential campaigns over the past few decades, said the president and Musk are both right.Carney, who steered Preserve America, another top-spending Trump-aligned super PAC, told Fox News that Trump "might have won without the help, but you can't underestimate how important that help was."Pointing to Preserve America, Musk's America PAC and MAGA Inc, which was the main Trump-aligned super PAC, Carney said they all deserved "a tremendous amount of credit" and "just made it easier" for Trump to sweep all seven battleground states and win the White House.Carney also highlighted the Musk-aligned super PAC's "unprecedented field effort, mail and other communications to turn out these low-propensity Trump voters."CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPTom Eddy, the GOP chairman in Erie County, a longtime crucial swing county in the northwestern corner of battleground Pennsylvania, told Fox News that Musk "helped Trump significantly. I really think so. He had money, and he had a name."But Eddy added that "my gut feeling would be that Trump is basically saying, Look. I won the election. These people helped me, but I won. That's what he's trying to bring across."In battleground Michigan, veteran Republican strategist Dennis Lennox pointed to Musk's comments and told Fox News "its incredibly arrogant to say that, but its probably true."

The Trump administration is asking the Supreme Court to block a lower court ruling that is keeping it from restructuring the Department of Education."That injunction effectively appoints the district court to a Cabinet role and bars the Executive Branch from terminating anyone, even though respondents conceded that some other [reductions in force] would plainly be proper," the SCOTUS filing reads.President Donald Trump has made it clear that he would seek to restructure and even dismantle the Department of Education. In fact, when he nominated Education Secretary Linda McMahon, he said her goal should be to "put herself out of a job." The president cited poor performance as one of his reasons for seeking to shut down the DOE.The Nations Report Card, which assesses how American students are performing in various subjects, showed seven out of 10 fourth graders are not proficient readers, which is a worse score than the last report card in 2022. The report card noted that reading scores showed "no significant change" since 1992.The administration has faced both political and legal pushback on its quest to get rid of the department. In February, several Democrats attempted to enter the Department of Education building in D.C., but were blocked by an employee.During the incident in February, Democrats repeatedly slammed the Trump administration and accused it of lacking transparency.This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.

FIRST ON FOX: The chairman of the House Budget Committee is pushing back on Elon Musk's claim that President Donald Trump's "big, beautiful bill" is full of "pork."Chairman Jodey Arrington, R-Texas, told Fox News Digital it was not possible for "pork barrel spending" to be included in the legislation, called a budget reconciliation bill, because the reconciliation process was simply not the mechanism for such federal funds."Reconciliation does not have anything to do with discretionary spending - earmarks, and all of that," Arrington said. "And quite frankly, the [Department of Government Efficiency] findings were, I think, almost entirely an issue for . . . annual appropriations.""Discretionary spending" refers to the annual dollars allocated by Congress each year through the appropriations process also known as "spending bills."HOUSE GOP TARGETS ANOTHER DEM OFFICIAL ACCUSED OF BLOCKING ICE AMID DELANEY HALL FALLOUTIt's a process that's historically known to be rife with "pork barrel spending" from both Republicans and Democrats funding for pet projects or other specific initiatives benefiting a certain member of Congress' district.But reconciliation deals with the government's "mandatory spending" largely government welfare programs that can only be amended by changing the law."We're dealing with mandatory spending programs entitlements, health care, welfare and the tax code," Arrington said."We did a responsible bill. There's no pork in it. The question, I think, for some folks and the objective of mine and my budget committee members was, whatever we're doing on tax or security to unleash growth and to buy greater security for the American people, we wanted it to be done in a fiscally responsible way."Senior White House adviser Stephen Miller echoed that sentiment on X: "The reconciliation bill cuts taxes, seals the border and reforms welfare. It is not a spending bill. There is no pork. It is the campaign agenda codified."MIKE JOHNSON, DONALD TRUMP GET BIG, 'BEAUTIFUL WIN AS BUDGET PASSES HOUSEThe vast majority of the trillions of dollars in the bill are aimed at Trump's tax policies extending his 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) while implementing new priorities like eliminating taxes on tips and overtime wages.There's also $4 trillion in House Republicans' versions of the bill aimed at raising the debt limit.The legislation is also aimed at amending current laws to enable new funding for border security and Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) projected to boost those priorities by billions of dollars.To offset those costs, House GOP leaders are seeking stricter work requirements for Medicaid and food stamps, while shifting more of the cost burden for both programs to the states.Republicans are also looking to roll back green energy tax subsidies in former President Joe Biden's Inflation Reduction Act (IRA).But Musk and other fiscal hawks' main concern has been that the legislation does not go far enough with those spending cuts.They've also raised concerns about the overall bill adding to the national debt which is currently nearing $37 trillion.As part of his social media campaign against the bill, Musk called for both eliminating the tax cuts and removing the debt limit increase from the final legislation.Musk reposted another X user who wrote, "Drop the tax cuts, cut some pork, get the bill through."He's also shown support on X for Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., and his call to strip the debt limit provision out of the bill.The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has projected that the bill would cut taxes by $3.7 trillion while raising deficits by $2.4 trillion over a decade.

A drug intended to treat menopause symptoms could double as breast cancer prevention.New research from Northwestern University in Illinois found that Duavee, a Pfizer-made drug, "significantly reduced" breast tissue cell growth, which is a major indicator of cancer progression.A phase 2 clinical trial included 141 post-menopausal women who had been diagnosed with ductal carcinoma in situ (DCIS), also known as stage 0 breast cancer, according to a press release from Northwestern.PROSTATE CANCER DRUG NOW AVAILABLE TO MORE PATIENTS WITH AGGRESSIVE FORM OF DISEASEThis non-invasive breast cancer affects more than 60,000 American women each year, often leading to an outcome of invasive breast cancer.The women were separated into two groups one received Duavee and the other took a placebo for a month before undergoing breast surgery.Duavee is a conjugated estrogen/bazedoxifene (CE/BZA) drug, which combines estrogen with another medication that minimizes the potential harmful side effects of the hormone."The key takeaway from the study is that CE/BZA slows the growth (proliferation) of cells in milk ducts of DCIS that expressed the estrogen receptor significantly more than placebo," Dr. Swati Kulkarni, lead investigator and professor of breast surgery at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, told Fox News Digital.EXPERIMENTAL WOMEN'S CANCER DRUG BOOSTS SURVIVAL RATES IN NOTABLE STUDYAnother major finding is that the quality of life did not differ significantly between the two groups, but patients who took the CE/BZA reported fewer hot flashes during the study, she noted."This would be expected, as the drug is FDA-approved to treat hot flashes."Kulkarni presented the study last week at the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO) Annual Meeting in Chicago.The findings are preliminary and have not yet been published in a medical journal."What excites me most is that a medication designed to help women feel better during menopause may also reduce their risk of invasive breast cancer," said the doctor, who is also a Northwestern Medicine breast surgeon.Women who face a higher risk of breast cancer including those who have experienced "high-risk lesions" and who also have menopausal symptoms are most likely to benefit from the drug, according to Kulkarni."These women are typically advised against standard hormone therapies, leaving them with few menopausal treatment options," the release stated.The researchers said they are "encouraged" by these early results, but more research is required before the medication can be considered for approval as a breast cancer prevention mechanism."Our findings suggest that CE/BZA may prevent breast cancer, but larger studies with several years of follow-up are needed before we would know this for sure," Kulkarni told Fox News Digital.Dr. Sheheryar Kabraji, chief of breast medicine at the Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center in Buffalo, New York, was not involved in the study but commented on the findings."While intriguing, this study is highly preliminary, and more research will be needed before we can conclude that conjugated estrogen/bazedoxifene (CD/BZA), a form of the hormone estrogen commonly prescribed to address symptoms of menopause, prevents invasive breast cancer or is effective at reducing cancer risk," she told Fox News Digital.CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP FOR OUR HEALTH NEWSLETTERKabraji also noted that the study focused on reducing levels of one specific protein, "which does not always predict reduced recurrence of breast cancer.""This study did not directly show that CE/BZA treatment reduces the risk of DCIS recurrence or development of invasive cancer," she noted."Importantly, however, patients who received this therapy experienced no worsening of quality of life, and saw improvement in vasomotor symptoms, such as hot flashes. If found to be effective in preventing breast cancer, CE/BZA is likely to have fewer side effects than current medications used for breast cancer prevention."For more Health articles, visitwww.foxnews.com/healthLead researcher Kulkarni emphasized that this medication is not for the treatment of invasive breast cancer or DCIS."Right now, we can say that women who are concerned about their risk of developing breast cancer can consider this medication to treat their menopausal symptoms," she added.

The attorneys representing the former Letcher County, Kentucky sheriff who stands accused of murdering the county's judge in his chambers have filed a new motion to have their client's indictment dismissed, according to a report.Former sheriff Shawn "Mickey" Stines' lawyers say the state failed to record a November 2024 meeting between state prosecutors and the Letcher County grand jury that eventually indicted Stines, according to a court filing obtained by KAVE.The filing says the grand jury was "deprived of information known to the Commonwealth [of Kentucky], sought in question by grand jurors, but not disclosed."MOTIVE REVEALED IN KENTUCKY SHERIFFS ALLEGED KILLING OF JUDGE AS BODY LANGUAGE EXPERT ANALYZES NEW VIDEOStines allegedly shot District Judge Kevin Mullins in Mullins' own chambers in the Letcher County Courthouse on Sept. 19, 2024. The incident, which rocked the tiny rural town, was caught on a surveillance camera. Both Stines and Mullins were well-known pillars of the community for decades.Specifically, the motion filed by attorney duo Jeremy and Kerri Bartley says the grand jury was denied information about an ongoing civil lawsuit, in which Stines is named as a defendant, that could provide context for the shooting.The lawyers also claim that testimony before the grand jury from Kentucky State Police Detective Clayton Stamper, the lead investigator in the case, was unfairly prejudicial.Stines' attorneys claim that allegations of sexual abuse plagued the Letcher County Courthouse.'EXTREMELY PARANOID' KENTUCKY SHERIFF QUESTIONED BY POLICE MOMENTS AFTER JUDGE'S FATAL SHOOTING: VIDEOJust three days before the shooting, Stines was deposed in a civil case against his former deputy, Ben Fields, who is currently serving prison time for raping a woman inside the courthouse in exchange for removing her ankle monitor while she was on home confinement during criminal proceedings.Jeremy Bartley told Fox News Digital that the sheriff had threatened to keep his mouth shut in the civil case, and that he feared for the safety of his wife and daughter."On the day that this [shooting] happened, my client had attempted multiple times to contact his wife and daughter, and he firmly believed that they were in danger," Bartley said. "He believed that they were in danger because of what he knew to have happened within the courthouse. And there was pressure, and there were threats made to him to sort of keep him in line, to keep them from saying more than these folks wanted him to say.""I think one of the big things is that my client felt there had been pressure placed on him not to say too much during the deposition, and not to talk about things that happened within the courthouse, particularly in the judge's chambers," Bartley said.Body camera footage from the immediate aftermath of the shooting shows a paranoid Stines afraid for his life while being questioned by police."Come on, be fair to me now," Stines can be heard saying to Stamper. "I seen the look Y'all come on now, don't kill me. Don't punish me, you know. Let's be fair. Don't shoot me, nothing like that.""Y'all are gonna kill me, aren't you?" he asked. "Y'all are gonna kill me, I know you are. Let's just get it over with. Let's just go."Bartley is planning an insanity defense.Experts have denounced that defense as "frivolous."Fox News Digital reached out to Bartley and prosecutor Jackie Steele for comment.

A Seattle man died after falling 3,000 feet from a climbing route at Denali National Park in Alaska, the National Park Service said Wednesday.Alex Chiu, 41, was ascending the West Buttress route of Mount McKinley on Monday, June 2, one of the parks most frequently climbed routes, while not attached to a rope, the agency said in a statement.He was ski mountaineering, which involves ascending and descending the route with skis. He was joined by two others in his expedition to conquer North America's highest peak.Two others witnessed his fall onto the rocky face covered in jagged ice, and lowered themselves over the edge as far as they could, but they could not see or hear him after the fall, officials said.ALASKA MAN SURVIVES BEING PINNED FACE-DOWN BY 700-POUND BOULDER IN CREEK AFTER HELP FROM HIS WIFEThe mountaineers descended the route to ask for assistance at Camp 1, which is located around 7,800 feet up the mountain.Due to high winds and snow, ground and air search teams were unable to quickly reach the area where he had fallen on Monday. On Wednesday, clear weather allowed two rangers to depart Talkeetna, a village south of the mountain, in a helicopter search for Chiu.When his body was found, it was transferred to the state medical examiner, the agency said. Fox News Digital has reached out to the Alaska State Medical Examiner's Office for Chiu's official cause of death.Chiu was an aerospace engineer at the Federal Aviation Administration and, before that, a software engineer at Boeing, according to his LinkedIn profile. On his social media accounts, he described himself as a storyteller, traveler, scuba diver, rock climber, alpinist and marathon runner.He wrote on his Instagram account about how living in Seattle allowed him to take his ice-climbing tools to the mountains every weekend. He shared that following the daily grind of his 9-to-5, he would pack up his gear and head to the mountains."I had become so good at what I did that I started teaching others how to do it, and that was even more fun to teach others how to experience the joy you have in these wild places," he wrote in an Instagram post. "When I am in the mountains, I realize I was at my best. I was smart, witty, passionate, and bold."FATAL FALL IN WASHINGTONS NORTH CASCADES KILLS 3, LEAVES 1 SURVIVORThe pandemic put the brakes on his alpine climbs, but he dreamed of heading back to the climb."So tomorrow I am getting on an airplane to Alaska," he wrote in an Instagram post on May 19, "in an attempt to climb the third-highest peak in the world because I dont want to know what happens to a dream deferred."The busiest season on the mountain lasts from mid-May to mid-June; there were about 500 climbers on it Wednesday, the agency said. Chiu is one of several people who have died while climbing Mount McKinley or other areas of Denali National Park.In April 2024, 52-year-old Robbi Mecus, of Keene Valley, New York, fell to his death while climbing an estimated 1,000 feet off Mount Johnson in the national park.The NPS said that a similar accident happened in 2010, in a similar location. That incident involved an unroped French mountaineer, who fell to his death on the Peters Glacier. His body was never recovered.

A pair of bills cracking down on sanctuary cities passed the House of Representatives this week with the support of multiple Democrats.On Thursday, the House passed a bill to withdraw Small Business Administration (SBA) services from jurisdictions that shelter illegal immigrants.The legislation passed the House in a 211 to 199 vote, with five Democrats joining the GOP: Reps. Henry Cuellar of Texas, Laura Gillen of New York, Don Davis of North Carolina, Jared Golden of Maine and Marie Gluesenkamp Perez of Washington.DEMS FUME OVER 'DUE PROCESS' FOR ABREGO GARCIA DESPITE LONG HISTORY OF PARTY BUCKING THE LEGAL PRINCIPLEThat's despite House Democratic leaders urging lawmakers to vote against the bill.SBA offices at the regional, district and local levels would be required to relocate if the administration publicly designated their locations as sanctuary jurisdictions."House Republicans are holding these cities accountable for their refusal to follow immigration law and protect their citizens," House Majority Whip Tom Emmer of Minnesota, the No. 3 House Republican, told Fox News Digital of the bill."Under President Trump, lawlessness that endangers the American people and prioritizes illegal aliens will not be rewarded with federal dollars and resources."The second bill, which passed on Friday morning, would add explicit language banning people in the U.S. illegally from obtaining SBA loans.Eight Democrats voted for that legislation Perez, Cuellar, Gillen and Davis all voted for the bill, along with Reps. Tom Suozzi of New York, Josh Harder of California, Marcy Kaptur of Ohio and Kristen McDonald Rivet of Michigan.House Democratic leaders did not appear to give their caucus guidance on how to vote for the bill.MAXINE WATERS FLOATS DEPORTING MELANIA TRUMP IN ANTI-DOGE DIATRIBEIt is a sign of illegal immigrations continued potency as a political issue, after proving key to Republicans victories in the House, Senate and White House last year.The former bill was introduced by Rep. Brad Finstad, R-Minn., and the latter by Rep. Beth Van Duyne, R-Texas.

Every divorce is painful, even the ones we see coming. The MAGA faithfulthose whove spent the last decade weathering smear campaigns, censorship, and mockery for backing a man who promised to drain the swampnow face a difficult reckoning. Its time to pick sides. And make no mistake: this is a split. The Trump-Musk bromance, once filled with mutual nods and occasional meme-sharing affection, is over. And thats not a tragedy. Its clarity.Because while many on the right have admired Elon Musk for his defiance of woke orthodoxy, his skirmishes with legacy media, and his talent for commanding attention, he was never truly aligned with the mission. Elon isnt fighting for America. Hes fighting for something else entirely: bandwidth, bots, and Mars.Trump? Hes still fighting for you.DEMOCRATS BEGIN TO EMBRACE MUSK AMID TRUMP SPAT AFTER PARTY RAILED AGAINST HIM AS A 'DICTATOR'For a while, it was convenient to pretend the two men were aligned. Both billionaires. Both anti-establishment disruptors. Both hated by the same people. But thats a surface readinga lazy one. Scratch even slightly beneath, and what emerges is a yawning ideological gap between a nationalist and a globalist. A man trying to restore Americas sovereignty, and a man trying to abandon Earth entirely.Trumps project has always been terrestrial. He wants factories in Michigan, borders in Texas, and jobs in Ohio. He wants to make America great again, not because its nostalgic, but because it was workinguntil it wasnt. Musk, on the other hand, wants to make Mars habitable. He talks about humanity like a species, not a nation. Its not evil. But its not patriotic either. Musks horizon doesnt stop at the Pacificit doesnt even stop at the stratosphere.And when it comes to allegiance, Musks is flexibletransactional. He sides with whoever can help him build the next piece of his empire. One day its Trump. The next, it's Xi Jinping, who previously rolled out the red carpet while Musk praised Chinas "work ethic" and handed over key patents for electric vehicle tech. This isnt a man committed to the West. Its a man committed to whatever works.This isnt a matter of good guy versus bad guy. Its a matter of side. One wants a sovereign America, and the other wants a scalable platform.REPUBLICAN LAWMAKERS STAND FIRM AGAINST MUSK'S KILL THE BILL ASSAULT ON TRUMP'S AGENDALets not forget who these men are. Donald Trump is crude, sure. But hes clear. He believes the American worker has been screwed, the middle class decimated, and the country handed over to foreign interests and multinational parasites. And hes not wrong. He ran on a promise to put America first.Musk, on the other hand, believes the solution to our problems is a blend of Neuralink, Starlink, and some theoretical Martian colony where free speech exists in the form of X Premium subscriptions. His obsession isnt justiceits optimization. He doesnt care about restoring the American Dream. He wants to replace it with a simulation.Look closely, and youll see that Musks libertarian chic has always been more about license than liberty. He wants fewer rulesnot necessarily more rights. His vision isnt rooted in the Constitution. Its rooted in code.ELON MUSK MAY SPEAK TO TRUMP AIDES IN PUSH TO CALM FEUDMeanwhile, Trump stands for something dangerous in elite circles: limits. Borders. Culture. Memory. The idea that you cant code your way out of decline. That you actually have to fight for your country, not automate it out of existence. Thats why the regime hates him. And why some on the right, mesmerized by Musks IQ and memes, need to wake the hell up.Because this divorce was inevitable. The man who wants to lead a nation cant stay hitched to the man who wants to lead a species. And the man who wants to win the hearts and minds of blue-collar America cant march in lockstep with the guy whos building a rocket in Texas to colonize Olympus Mons.Its fine to admire Musks courage in certain cultural battles. But admiration doesnt equal allegiance. This isnt about whos cool on X. This is about who shows up for the American worker. Who bleeds when this country bleeds. Who isnt looking for the eject button.So yesdivorces hurt. But sometimes theyre clarifying.CLICK HERE FOR MORE FOX NEWS OPINIONReal MAGA means putting America first. Not Mars. Not markets. Not memes.Trump doesnt want to terraform a new world. He wants to fight for this one.And if you believe this country is still worth saving, then your choice isnt complicated.Choose the president. Not the platform.Choose the man who confronts Chinanot the one who collaborates with it.Choose the man who fights for your landnot the one who dreams of leaving it.

The White House and congressional Republicans have said that President Donald Trumps sweeping tariffs would help pay for his mammoth tax bill, but tax experts say it depends on whether the president stays consistent.Senate Republicans are in the midst of hashing out their plan to tweak and reshape the presidents "big, beautiful bill," which includes Trumps desire to extend and make permanent his first-term tax policies.SENATE REPUBLICANS EYE CHANGES TO TRUMP'S MEGABILL AFTER HOUSE WINHowever, the tax portion of the bill alone is expected to cost roughly $4 trillion. And when factoring in spending cuts and other revenue and economic drivers, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found in a report earlier this week that, in all, the colossal legislative package would add $2.4 trillion to the deficit over the next decade.The CBO, which has come under recent scrutiny from congressional Republicans unhappy with the scoring of the presidents "big, beautiful bill," also found that Trumps tariffs would reduce the deficit by $2.8 trillion over the same period.Joe Rosenberg, a senior fellow at the left-leaning Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, told Fox News Digital that the reconciliation packages potential impact on the debt is more concerning now than in 2017, due to higher debt levels and rising interest rates.'GONE TOO FAR': GOP LAWMAKERS RALLY AROUND TRUMP AFTER MUSK RAISES EPSTEIN ALLEGATIONSWhen Republicans were putting together the president's original tax package, the national debt was roughly $20 trillion. Eight years later, that number has ballooned to over $36 trillion and counting.Rosenberg contended that if the CBOs report were taken as is, then Trumps tariffs would make the bill deficit neutral and then some. But the report assumed that the eye-popping sums that Trumps tariffs could generate were based on whether they were permanent."I think what we've seen is that the tariff policy, again, seems to change day by day, hour by hour, minute by minute," he said. "And the administration is a little bit inconsistent about whether they view tariffs as purely a revenue source versus essentially a negotiating tool."The report also found that in exchange for trillions in deficit reduction, household wealth would drop, and the economy would shrink each year over the next decade.Tad Dehaven, a policy analyst at the Cato Institute, argued that this factoralong with Trumps tariffs being tied up in court over constitutional challenges and their shifting applicationmakes any projected benefits "extraordinarily unlikely.""Let's pretend that these tariffs are going to remain in place for 10 years at some level delineated today. That's a major tax increase, so whatever alleged benefit you're receiving from the tax cut in the reconciliation package, it's being offset by a tax increase," he said. "And a rather economically inefficient one."TRUMP'S TARIFFS AND TAX CUTS ARE CRUSHING MAIN STREET AND MAKING MAR-A-LAGO ELITES RICHMike Palicz, director of tax policy at the conservative Americans for Tax Reform, scoffed at the CBOs recent scoring, and lamented the agency as "a bunch of bean counters" that often miss the mark on key pieces of legislation, like the presidents original Tax Cuts and Jobs Act.He argued that none of the outside noise should matter, telling Fox News Digital that "you cannot go out and explain to a normal person or business that their taxes aren't increasing next year if the Trump tax cuts are allowed to expire.""That's what the whole point of this exercise is, preventing the expiration of tax cuts, preventing the largest tax increase in American history," he said. "And no conservative, no Republican, should think that you address the deficit by raising taxes."

Every divorce is painful, even the ones we see coming. The MAGA faithfulthose whove spent the last decade weathering smear campaigns, censorship, and mockery for backing a man who promised to drain the swampnow face a difficult reckoning. Its time to pick sides. And make no mistake: this is a split. The Trump-Musk bromance, once filled with mutual nods and occasional meme-sharing affection, is over. And thats not a tragedy. Its clarity.Because while many on the right have admired Elon Musk for his defiance of woke orthodoxy, his skirmishes with legacy media, and his talent for commanding attention, he was never truly aligned with the mission. Elon isnt fighting for America. Hes fighting for something else entirely: bandwidth, bots, and Mars.Trump? Hes still fighting for you.DEMOCRATS BEGIN TO EMBRACE MUSK AMID TRUMP SPAT AFTER PARTY RAILED AGAINST HIM AS A 'DICTATOR'For a while, it was convenient to pretend the two men were aligned. Both billionaires. Both anti-establishment disruptors. Both hated by the same people. But thats a surface readinga lazy one. Scratch even slightly beneath, and what emerges is a yawning ideological gap between a nationalist and a globalist. A man trying to restore Americas sovereignty, and a man trying to abandon Earth entirely.Trumps project has always been terrestrial. He wants factories in Michigan, borders in Texas, and jobs in Ohio. He wants to make America great again, not because its nostalgic, but because it was workinguntil it wasnt. Musk, on the other hand, wants to make Mars habitable. He talks about humanity like a species, not a nation. Its not evil. But its not patriotic either. Musks horizon doesnt stop at the Pacificit doesnt even stop at the stratosphere.And when it comes to allegiance, Musks is flexibletransactional. He sides with whoever can help him build the next piece of his empire. One day its Trump. The next, it's Xi Jinping, who previously rolled out the red carpet while Musk praised Chinas "work ethic" and handed over key patents for electric vehicle tech. This isnt a man committed to the West. Its a man committed to whatever works.This isnt a matter of good guy versus bad guy. Its a matter of side. One wants a sovereign America, and the other wants a scalable platform.REPUBLICAN LAWMAKERS STAND FIRM AGAINST MUSK'S KILL THE BILL ASSAULT ON TRUMP'S AGENDALets not forget who these men are. Donald Trump is crude, sure. But hes clear. He believes the American worker has been screwed, the middle class decimated, and the country handed over to foreign interests and multinational parasites. And hes not wrong. He ran on a promise to put America first.Musk, on the other hand, believes the solution to our problems is a blend of Neuralink, Starlink, and some theoretical Martian colony where free speech exists in the form of X Premium subscriptions. His obsession isnt justiceits optimization. He doesnt care about restoring the American Dream. He wants to replace it with a simulation.Look closely, and youll see that Musks libertarian chic has always been more about license than liberty. He wants fewer rulesnot necessarily more rights. His vision isnt rooted in the Constitution. Its rooted in code.ELON MUSK MAY SPEAK TO TRUMP AIDES IN PUSH TO CALM FEUDMeanwhile, Trump stands for something dangerous in elite circles: limits. Borders. Culture. Memory. The idea that you cant code your way out of decline. That you actually have to fight for your country, not automate it out of existence. Thats why the regime hates him. And why some on the right, mesmerized by Musks IQ and memes, need to wake the hell up.Because this divorce was inevitable. The man who wants to lead a nation cant stay hitched to the man who wants to lead a species. And the man who wants to win the hearts and minds of blue-collar America cant march in lockstep with the guy whos building a rocket in Texas to colonize Olympus Mons.Its fine to admire Musks courage in certain cultural battles. But admiration doesnt equal allegiance. This isnt about whos cool on X. This is about who shows up for the American worker. Who bleeds when this country bleeds. Who isnt looking for the eject button.So yesdivorces hurt. But sometimes theyre clarifying.CLICK HERE FOR MORE FOX NEWS OPINIONReal MAGA means putting America first. Not Mars. Not markets. Not memes.Trump doesnt want to terraform a new world. He wants to fight for this one.And if you believe this country is still worth saving, then your choice isnt complicated.Choose the president. Not the platform.Choose the man who confronts Chinanot the one who collaborates with it.Choose the man who fights for your landnot the one who dreams of leaving it.