President Donald Trump is said to be closely watching the impeachment proceedings on Capitol Hill, but he’s also watching what billionaire techie Elon Musk is doing at SpaceX and Tesla — and he likes what he sees.

  • When asked about the recent rise in Tesla’s valuation, Trump quickly segued to Musk’s work at SpaceX, which hit a milestone this week in the development of the Crew Dragon space taxi for NASA’s use. “He likes rockets, and he does good at rockets, too, by the way.” Trump told CNBC during an interview at this week’s World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. “I never saw where the engines come down with no wings, no anything, and they’re landing.”
  • Trump said it’s “shocking how well” Musk has done with Tesla. “You go back a year, and they were talking about the end of the company,” he said. “And now all of a sudden they’re talking about these great things. He’s going to be building a very big plant in the United States. He has to, because we help him, so he has to help us.” That last reference had Musk-watchers wondering what Trump was talking about.
  • Then again, it wouldn’t be a Trump interview without some weirdness: At one point, he said Musk is “one of our great geniuses, and we have to protect our genius.” Then he added, “You know, we have to protect Thomas Edison, and we have to protect all of these people that came up with originally the light bulb, and the wheel and all of these things.” The wheel?
Like what you're reading? Subscribe to GeekWire's free newsletters to catch every headline

Job Listings on GeekWork

Find more jobs on GeekWork. Employers, post a job here.