Dean Phillips says Elon Musk has something in common with other historical geniuses that you might never expect

Former Democratic Minnesota Rep. Dean Phillips defended Elon Musk on Newsmax Friday and said the billionaire innovator is unfairly vilified by political opponents in the same way history has punished other brilliant minds.

Musk announced Wednesday that his term as a special government employee leading the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) has officially ended. During an appearance on “Rob Schmitt Tonight,” Phillips pushed back on Democrats who attack Musk.

“If you look through human history, it is the human condition to persecute the most innovative and most creative geniuses we’ve ever had. If in the Middle Ages you thought the earth was round, you were probably going to be burned at the stake,” Phillips said.

Phillips criticized lawmakers who threaten to investigate Musk.

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“I think Elon Musk is being subject to much of the same. This is a man who created, essentially created, the electric automobile category, a man who provided Starlink, which, by the way, if our government, and I voted for this bill along with a lot of my Republican colleagues,” Phillips said. “We allocated tens of billions of dollars to ensure that every American had access to high-speed internet. Well, frankly, if we had used Starlink, we wouldn’t have to lay any new cable. We would save a ton of money.”

Phillips described Musk as a solutions-oriented visionary.

“The man finds ways to achieve remarkable success at great value. NASA can’t do it. And now he’s about to use rockets to get us all the way around the world in about 30 minutes,” Phillips said.

Phillips pushed back after host Rob Schmitt highlighted Democratic Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin’s claim that Musk “sacked thousands of excellent government workers, caused the deaths of thousands of poor children in foreign lands” and profited off government contracts while destroying public services. Phillips said those kinds of attacks serve no purpose for Democrats or the country.

“So for an American congressman to demean probably the most innovative business leader in American history does no purpose for America, does no purpose for the Democratic Party,” Phillips said. “I think we all can say there’s a lot about Elon Musk that many of us like. And there’s a lot that troubles us. But I think we’ve got to get over this nonsense of attacking one another because the Chinese, the Russians and a lot of our adversaries are smiling when they watch us torture one another into oblivion.”

Phillips called for unity over partisanship and urged a return to principled debate without character attacks or cancel culture.

“So my message to everybody, Rob, I don’t care about your politics. I care about your principle and your patriotism. It’s time that we get back to supporting one another, criticizing one another, but not in a way that cancels the ability to be a patriot,” Phillips said.

Since joining the Trump administration, Musk played a key role in advancing efforts to overhaul federal spending. In February, his DOGE team drew intense backlash from Democrats after targeting the U.S. Agency for International Development for cuts, sparking protests that extended to Musk’s private ventures like Tesla.

In a March interview on “Special Report with Bret Baier,” Musk said his time in the administration was limited, with just 130 days allotted as a “special government employee.” He said he was confident that he and the DOGE team could complete most of the work needed to cut the deficit by $1 trillion within that period.

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