Author: Stephanie Gauthier

Confronted with protests against ICE and its anti-immigration policies, Donald Trump has hardened his aggressive rhetoric against protesters, the mayor of Los Angeles and California governor Gavin Newsom.

Protests have intensified in Los Angeles following President Donald Trump's order to deploy the National Guard.Authorities and demonstrators have clashed in the Los Angeles area, with unrest beginning last week after dozens of people were detained by federal immigration agents. cnn.it/4kZYcUB

— CNN (@cnn.com) 2025-06-09T02:33:10.529Z

Over the weekend, Trump ordered the deployment of the National Guard without the governor’s approval, referring to the protesters as “paid insurrectionists”.

In an unprecedented about-face, Trump even expressed the wish that members of the U.S. Army Navy be sent to Los Angeles against the protesters, placing 500 Marines on high alert.

The protests erupted in response to a series of coordinated ICE raids in Los Angeles, which were seen as particularly aggressive. Gatherings of protesters quickly formed in the neighborhoods targeted by these operations, notably in Compton.

The anti-ICE protests were quickly labeled by Donald Trump as “migrant riots”, claiming that Los Angeles had been “invaded and occupied by illegal aliens and criminals”.

On Truth Social, he declared that the demonstrators were not mere protesters, but troublemakers and “paid insurrectionists”, calling for their immediate arrest.

Tensions came to a head when some of the demonstrators provoked violent clashes with law enforcement, accompanied by acts of vandalism, fireworks and vehicle burning.

The situation calmed down slightly during the day on Monday, according to local authorities, before flaring up again. For Governor Gavin Newsom, Donald Trump’s actions are only fanning the flames of an already extremely fragile situation.

Interviewed by ABC News and CNN, Trump visibly tries to reduce their breakup to the billionaire’s sudden instability, even claiming that he doesn’t think about him at all anymore, despite the humiliation inflicted when Musk publicly accused him of being in the Epstein Files.

President Donald Trump told CNN this morning that he is “not even thinking about” billionaire Elon Musk and won’t be speaking to him in the near future.“I’m not even thinking about Elon. He’s got a problem. The poor guy’s got a problem,” Trump said. Read more: cnn.it/4kU0BjJ

— CNN (@cnn.com) 2025-06-06T12:42:15.582Z

In the aftermath of their public clash on their respective social networks, Trump claims that he’s already stopped thinking about Musk, and that although Musk is, in his view, trying to contact him, he has little desire to talk to him.

When asked by an ABC News reporter if he had a call scheduled with Elon Musk in the next few hours, Trump countered by calling the billionaire a man who has simply “lost his mind”.

“You mean the man who’s lost his mind?”, Trump reportedly retorted to the reporter before asserting that no, he wasn’t at all interested in talking to him before changing the subject.

On CNN , reporter Dana Bash, who met with the president several hours after the explosive events, reported that he was no longer thinking about Musk at all, and even described him as someone with a problem…

“Poor guy’s got a problem,” Trump reportedly quipped.

For now, Trump seems to be faring better than Musk, whose personal fortune, as well as that of his companies, has melted by billions of dollars in real time during their public feud.

Meanwhile, journalists who managed to obtain statements from Trump were visibly careful to avoid any questions about the accusations launched by Musk, who had notably suggested that the president was featured in the Epstein Files, a presence which, he claimed, would explain the non-disclosure of certain classified documents by Trump’s close allies, no less…

Donald Trump has broken his silence in the face of Elon Musk’s fierce criticism of his “Big beautiful bill”, saying he was “very disappointed” and claiming he would have preferred Musk to attack him rather than his bill: “I’d rather he criticize me than the bill.”

BREAKING: President Trump says he's 'very disappointed' in Elon Musk's attacks on the GOP spending bill, suggests he's bitter about losing the electric vehicle mandate."I've helped Elon a lot."

— NBC News (@nbcnews.com) 2025-06-05T16:32:18.652Z

Donald Trump seemed visibly surprised by the billionaire’s reaction, claiming that his revolt was only explained by the presence in the bill of the electric vehicle measures (EV mandates), which offered favorable tax credits to Tesla.

He adds that Elon Musk has known for a long time that these provisions were part of the text and claims that “Elon knew all along.”

While, according to NBC News, the president claims to have “always liked Elon” and enjoyed a “great relationship” with him, Musk’s characterization of his bill as a “disgusting abomination” seems to have been the last straw, and that Musk might be suffering, in turn, from “a form of Trump Derangement Syndrome”… or TDS.

Trump is now hinting that their friendship is probably in jeopardy.

But…

Whatever.

Keep the EV/solar incentive cuts in the bill, even though no oil & gas subsidies are touched (very unfair!!), but ditch the MOUNTAIN of DISGUSTING PORK in the bill.

In the entire history of civilization, there has never been legislation that both big and beautiful.…

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 5, 2025

The billionaire was keen to close the subject by reaffirming his own reading of the situation, suggesting that the relationship between the two men is well and truly broken.

Musk, who invested millions of dollars in the 2024 election to support Donald Trump, followed up his comments with a message…

…claiming that “without him”, Democrats would have control of the House and Trump would have simply lost the election.

“Without me, Trump would have lost the election,” Musk asserts.

Without me, Trump would have lost the election, Dems would control the House and the Republicans would be 51-49 in the Senate.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) June 5, 2025

It’s hard to say whether this verbal jousting will end there…

…as Trump seems to take Musk’s criticism as a direct attack against his mandate, while Musk openly claims his decisive role in the Republican victory.

Just days after leaving office under nebulous circumstances, sporting a black eye that many attribute to an altercation that precipitated his departure from the White House, Elon Musk railed against the Trump administration.

In an unexpected turnaround, he launched an offensive against the “Big Beautiful Bill”, saying he could no longer remain silent in the face of what he described as a “massive, outrageous, pork-filled Congressional spending bill”.

To mobilize public opinion, Musk is now urging Americans to “kill the bill”, sharing a poster of Quentin Tarantino’s film Kill Bill as a symbol of his crusade.

In another post, the billionaire tells Americans, “Call your senator, call your congressman, bankrupting America is NOT ok! KILL the BILL”.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Donald Trump is beginning to lose patience with Elon Musk, who is using his platform and 200 million subscribers to attack the presidential bill, despite their recent alliance.

The WSJ reports that Trump is frustrated by Musk’s growing influence over certain Republican elected officials such as Marjorie Taylor Greene (Georgia), Scott Perry (Pennsylvania) and Mike Flood (Nebraska), who now regret having supported the project and are publicly opposing it.

While Donald Trump’s representatives have adopted a measured tone in public in the face of Elon Musk’s virulent forwards against the “Big Beautiful Bill”, asserting that the president already knew the billionaire’s positions, Musk’s outing risks provoking internal tensions within the administration.

By announcing his intention to target all elected officials who supported the bill in the 2026 mid-term elections, asserting, “In November of next year, we will fire every politician who has betrayed the American people,” Elon Musk is clearly testing Republican unity…

It remains to be seen whether his call to Kill the Bill will end up shaking some of the party’s elected officials, or whether it will remain without any real political effect!

A few days after Ukraine’s spectacular victory in the military operation Operation Spiderweb, which targeted Russian military aircraft at bases across Russia, the Ukrainian president has returned to the origins of the offensive.

In an interview with journalists following the attack, relayed by the Kyiv Independent, he asserted that the operation, which had been planned for over a year, would simply not have taken place if Vladimir Putin had agreed to a ceasefire during the various peace talks.

Ukraine’s surprise attack on June 1, carried out using drones boldly concealed inside cabin roofs that could be opened remotely, then delivered aboard trucks parked near their targets across Russia, took the world by surprise.

Even Donald Trump, the President of the United States, had not been informed of this operation, which had been planned in secret for over a year by the Ukrainian armed forces, while Zelensky claimed that the attack was avoidable in his opinion: “If there had been a ceasefire, would the operation have taken place? No.”

According to the Ukrainian Armed Forces, Russia lost 41 military aircraft, including Tu-95s and Tu-22M3s, key bombers for launching long-range cruise missiles used against Ukraine, during Operation Spiderweb.

The damage inflicted on Russia is estimated at over 7 billion dollars, a major loss and, according to several experts, largely irreplaceable, as the destroyed bombers are among the rarest and most expensive strategic aircraft in the Russian arsenal.

After several days of silence, Donald Trump declared on Truth Social that he had had a talk of over an hour with the Russian president. According to him, they discussed the Ukrainian-led attack on aircraft stationed at Russian bases, as well as the multiple strikes carried out on both sides.

Elon Musk surprised many, no doubt including several members of the White House, by exploding on X against a pillar of Trump’s political agenda, and just days after officially stepping down from his DOGE role in the administration.

He lashed out violently at Trump’s gigantic bill and its allies, remarks that obviously didn’t fail to provoke a reaction.

Moreover, the billionaire threatened all elected officials who supported the bill in the 2026 mid-term elections:

“In November next year, we fire all politicians who betrayed the American people.”

Recall that the Republican bill supporting Trump’s agenda, passed by the House, would add $2.4 trillion to the debt over ten years.

A stark contrast to the drastic budget cuts implemented at DOGE under Elon Musk’s leadership, which actually provoked his ire on his own social network, where he lambasted elected officials who voted in favor of the Trump agenda.

Elon Musk’s divorce from the Trump administration is taking a stormy turn. In his latest public appearance at the White House, sporting a black eye, Musk fueled speculation.

He is said to hold strong grudges against certain team members, such as Peter Navarro, whom he called a “moron”, but also against political decisions that have hurt his companies, XaI’s exclusion from a Trump administration contract with OpenAI, the end of the tax credit for electric cars.

The “Big, Beautiful Bill” was the last straw for Musk.

Since returning to the White House in January 2025, Donald Trump has put the fight against immigration back at the heart of his agenda, promising a near-hermetic closure of the southern border and implementing controversial measures aimed at mass deportation of migrants already on US soil.

Nearly 20 relatives of the notorious drug lord crossed the U.S. border thanks to a deal made with the Trump administration.

— The Daily Beast (@thedailybeast.bsky.social) 2025-05-14T18:25:11.301Z

Yet, according to The Daily Beast, in May, some twenty people close to Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, the former leader of the dreaded Mexican Sinaloa cartel, currently serving a life sentence in an ultra-secure prison in Colorado, quietly crossed the US border, with the explicit endorsement of the Trump administration.

According to the Mexican authorities, the entry of El Chapo’s relatives into the United States was not an impromptu escape. They claim that it was authorized under a confidential agreement between the Trump administration and El Chapo’s son, Ovidio Guzmán, who is currently incarcerated in the United States. Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum expressed surprise at this operation, which was carried out without bilateral coordination.

Yet this same cartel has been officially classified as a terrorist organization by Washington since 2024, a designation established under the Biden administration to broaden the legal means to combat its transnational operations.

While Trump claims an ironclad migration policy, his behind-the-scenes arrangements with drug-trafficking figures are drawing sharp criticism and revealing troubling exceptions.

This blatant breach highlights Donald Trump’s double standards: while he is stepping up mass deportations of migrants, often settled for years on American soil, to third countries or even Salvadoran prisons, he is rolling out the red carpet for relatives of a Mexican cartel classified as a terrorist.

Several days after the revelation of this information, no official explanation had yet been provided as to why Donald Trump had, in May, mysteriously opened the doors of American territory to El Chapo’s family.

As Donald Trump embarked on a Middle East tour marked by colossal deals, including a $142 billion arms contract with Saudi Arabia and a $1.4 trillion, ten-year commitment with the Emirates for infrastructure in AI, Qatar simultaneously gifted him an ultra-luxurious private jet worth $400 million, sparking controversy.

Elon Musk tried to derail a major artificial intelligence infrastructure deal in the Middle East after learning that his startup, xAI, would be excluded from the initiative, CNBC has confirmed.

— CNBC (@cnbc.com) 2025-05-29T21:00:15Z

More discreet, Elon Musk accompanied the President in the shadows, taking advantage of the occasion to forge his own alliances and try to secure strategic agreements for his companies such as Starlink, Tesla, xAI and X.

Prior to Donald Trump’s return to the presidency in 2025, relations between Elon Musk and the Middle East were rather strained. Even though Saudi funds had invested in Tesla and X, friction persisted, notably due to the Khashoggi affair, disagreements over freedom of expression and Musk’s criticism of certain regimes in the region.

Since Trump’s return to the White House, Musk’s relations with the Gulf have strengthened. In April 2025, just before the Middle East tour, xAI bought X in a $33 billion deal, financially backed by Saudi Arabia’s Kingdom Holding and the Qatar Investment Authority.

Although his presence alongside Donald Trump on the Middle East tour was never officially announced, Elon Musk actively worked behind the scenes to advance his own business interests and attempt to short-circuit those of his competitors.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Elon Musk tried to intervene in a $500 billion deal between OpenAI and Emirati company G42 to build AI data centers in Abu Dhabi. He reportedly lobbied to include xAI, without success, a major setback for the billionaire.

In a more positive turn of events for Elon Musk during his trip alongside Trump, his Starlink satellite Internet service reportedly won approval to operate in Saudi Arabia, strengthening its strategic position within the Gulf technology market.

Musk used the trip to attend the Saudi-American Investment Forum in Riyadh, where he announced his ambition to deploy Tesla’s robotaxis in Saudi Arabia and unveiled Optimus humanoid robots.

By discreetly joining Donald Trump’s Middle East tour, Elon Musk was able to exploit a favorable diplomatic context to advance his interests. Despite a few setbacks, he achieved tangible results, such as the green light for Starlink in Saudi Arabia and increased exposure for Tesla.

US President Donald Trump has been trying for several weeks to reach an agreement with Iran on its nuclear program. But this project now seems to be undermined by Israel’s growing tensions.

As the Trump administration tries to negotiate a nuclear deal with Iran, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel has been threatening to upend the talks by striking Iran’s main nuclear enrichment facilities, according to officials briefed on the situation.

— The New York Times (@nytimes.com) 2025-05-28T09:36:37.034Z

According to the New York Times, the Israeli president is clearly determined to launch direct strikes against Iran’s main nuclear enrichment facilities.

Yet Trump has recently given assurances that negotiations are progressing positively, and that an announcement on a deal could be made in the coming days.

However, this diplomatic initiative could clash with the more aggressive stance of Benjamin Netanyahu, who favors a military approach to dealing with the Iranian nuclear threat.

According to the same sources, Israel had planned strikes as early as April, but these were temporarily postponed at Trump’s request, in the prospect of giving diplomacy a chance.

Excluded from current negotiations, Israel is now advocating military intervention, even without US support, believing that Iran is going through a period of strategic vulnerability.

This perception is based in particular on Israeli strikes at the end of 2024, which destroyed several key elements of the defenses protecting Iran’s nuclear sites.

The New York Times recently painted a disturbing picture of Elon Musk’s drug habits. Although the Wall Street Journal has previously reported on these practices, the NYT investigation claims that the scale of the billionaire’s consumption is far greater than previously assumed, or than he himself has acknowledged.

In public, Elon Musk was rising to political power as one of President Trump’s key allies. In private, Musk was taking drugs and facing an increasingly turbulent family life amid overlapping romantic relationships and legal battles over his children. Read more: nyti.ms/4mDTEVr

— The New York Times (@nytimes.com) 2025-05-30T11:22:27.348Z

While he claimed to treat his “negative moods” only with small doses of ketamine, about once every two weeks in his own words, several observers pointed to public appearances where Elon Musk seemed visibly under the influence of drugs.

One of the most talked-about examples remains his presence at Donald Trump’s inauguration, where he was filmed staring at the ceiling, head and eyes swirling, a behavior interpreted by many as evidence of increased consumption, just as he was in the president’s direct orbit.

According to sources close to his consumption habits quoted by the New York Times, Elon Musk would not limit himself to ketamine: he would also use hallucinogenic mushrooms and ecstasy. The newspaper claims that he has developed an excessive consumption of these substances.

But the New York Times goes further, claiming that Elon Musk’s ketamine consumption, which he publicly downplayed, would have become so extensive that it would have led to medical complications.

According to the newspaper, the substance caused him bladder problems in particular, a well-documented symptom of excessive or chronic ketamine consumption.

While Elon Musk’s behavior at several political events has fueled suspicions of possible drug use, these allegations are based on behavior deemed erratic at official meetings or public appearances. Musk, for his part, has categorically denied these accusations.

Now that he’s back in business full-time, forsaking politics for the time being at least, will these allegations of drug abuse have an impact on Elon Musk’s future?

That remains to be seen.