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- Elon Musk posted a video Monday morning celebrating international trade.
- Over the weekend, Musk slyly jabbed Trump’s tariffs in social media posts and public statements.
- Stocks swung wildly on Monday, with the S&P 500 briefly nearing a bear market.
Bright and early Monday morning, Elon Musk posted a video on X: Milton Friedman, the economist and free-market enthusiast, musing about the benefits of international trade.
The video comes as President Donald Trump’s tariffs pummel global markets, with the S&P 500 slipping into bear market territory and stocks swinging wildly. Investors are bracing for an international trade war. Representatives for the White House did not immediately respond to Business Insider’s request for comment.
Monday’s post — which shows Friedman holding a seemingly simple pencil and celebrating its complicated, cross-continental production — builds on a pattern of pointed statements from Musk, the de facto leader of the White House DOGE Office.
On Saturday, Musk said he’d want to see a “zero-tariff” system and “free trade zone” between the United States and Europe. That same day, Musk went after Trump’s top trade advisor, Peter Navarro, on X, writing, “A PhD in Econ from Harvard is a bad thing, not a good thing.”
Navarro is publicly pro-tariff and responded to Musk’s jab in interviews on Sunday and Monday, deepening the divide between the two top advisors.
Trump told reporters on Sunday that he didn’t want to see markets tank, but “sometimes you have to take medicine to fix something.”
The White House didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment for this story.
The prospect of a recession is growing stronger, and in a letter to shareholders, JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon warned that “stagflation” could slow down the economy. Americans across the country rallied against Trump this weekend, with many focused on the current economic turmoil.
