Joe Yates
Elon Musk has labeled one of President Donald Trump's top adviser a 'moron' after he was criticised over the assembly of his Teslas.
Peter Navarro, the president's senior counselor for trade and manufacturing, publicly called on the richest man in the world to assemble all parts of his electric vehicles in the US rather than cutting costs by ordering parts in foreign countries.
The Tesla CEO didn't take kindly on the 75-year-old's call for action, taking to the social media platform that he owns, Twitter, to demonize the former convict - who served four months in prison in January last year for Contempt of Congress over refusal to attend court over the Jan 6 US Capitol attack, in 2021.
"Navarro is truly a moron. What he says here is demonstrably false," slammed Musk.
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The billionaire went on to claim that his brand has the 'most American-made cars', compared to other automobiles like Ford, before adding: "Navarro is dumber than a sack of bricks."
Yesterday (April 8), White House spokesperson Karoline Leavitt dismissed the row between the pair as 'boys being boys', when asked about it from reporters.
"These are obviously two individuals who have very different views on trade and on tariffs," she said.
"Boys will be boys, and we will let their public sparring continue," Leavitt added.
So what exactly did Navarro say then?
Well, his comments came while being interviewed by CNBC about Trump's sweeping tariff policy, which he has had some sway in.
"When it comes to tariffs and trade, we all understand in the White House, and the American people understand, that Elon's a car manufacturer - but he's not a car manufacturer, he's a car assembler in many cases," he told the station.
"If you go to his Texas plant, a good part of the engines that he gets, which in the EV case is the batteries come from Japan and come from China. The electronics come from Taiwan.
"The difference is in our thinking and Elon's on this is that we want the tires made in Akron [Ohio], we want the transmissions made in Indianapolis [Indiana], we want the engines made in Flint and Saginaw [both Michigan], and we want the cars manufactured here."
Navarro continued: "It's like this business model where BMW and Mercedes come in to Spartanburg, South Carolina, and have us assemble German engines and Austrian transmissions. That doesn't work for America - it's bad for our economics, it's bad for our national security. We want them to come here.
"With Elon, it's fine, he's a car man - if he's a car person, that's what he does. And he wants the cheap foreign parts, and we understand that, but we want him home. We want him home for our national security, economic security and everything's good with Elon."