President Trump is locked in a showdown with the world’s richest man, who is far from a typical opponent.
Since taking office in January, President Trump has faced almost no meaningful opposition.
Congress has been acquiescent and conspicuously uninterested in oversight. He has bulldozed past the courts to impose his will on immigration policy and exact retribution on law firms and universities. Conservative media outlets have backed him and his agenda, and some mainstream news organizations have been cowed.
But now Mr. Trump is not just confronting a powerful foe for the first time this year — he is going toe-to-toe with an angry rival in Elon Musk, who has the capacity to sustain a fight and shares the president’s go-for-jugular instincts and willingness to scorch the earth to achieve even short-term advantage.
It is a new challenge for Mr. Trump, who has always had a knack for cowing and humiliating rivals and using social media and the soft and hard powers of the presidency to steamroll any opposition.
Mr. Musk, who owns X and has 220 million followers, can match or arguably exceed Mr. Trump’s volume on social media, given the limited reach of Truth Social, the president’s own platform.
Mr. Trump may be a billionaire, but Mr. Musk is the world’s wealthiest man and among its most successful entrepreneurs and technology visionaries.