Hour 1 - You Don't Build By Taking

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Clay Travis and Buck Sexton Show

Episode: Hour 1 - "You Don't Build By Taking"
Date: June 16, 2026
Host: Clay Travis (Buck Sexton out)

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Clay Travis (solo hosting) explores the economic, political, and cultural implications of Elon Musk’s milestone as the world’s first trillionaire following the SpaceX IPO. Clay contrasts the left and right’s responses to Musk’s success, touches on recent economic news (falling oil prices, market highs), and takes calls from listeners who share personal connections to the transformative power of entrepreneurship and capitalism. The main theme centers on building wealth through innovation vs. redistributing existing resources.

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Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Economic Headlines and Context

(02:36 – 06:00)

• Oil and Gas Prices:

  • Oil/gas prices fell to $75/barrel; $3/gallon gasoline expected soon nationwide, with exceptions for places like California due to local policies.
  • Market indices like the Dow hit new records (~52,000), indicating economic optimism.
  • Ongoing situations discussed briefly: Iran war/gas prices, Trump at the G7 in France.

• SpaceX Goes Public:

  • Clay sets the stage: SpaceX’s public offering saw its stock price surge, with Elon Musk crossing into trillionaire status, holding roughly half the company's equity.

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2. Elon Musk as a Capitalist Icon

(06:00 – 17:41, 20:16 – 25:49)

• Political Reactions:

  • Democratic nominee Graham Platner’s tweet:
    • “Elon Musk just became the world’s first trillionaire. Let’s make sure he’s also the last.” (06:56)
    • Clay unpacks the “implicit threat” and sees the remark as emblematic of a redistributive, zero-sum worldview.

• Republican vs. Democrat Worldview:

  • Democrats: See wealth as a fixed pie—success by some requires taking from others.
  • Republicans: See opportunity in expanding the pie—encourage more people to become successful, building generational wealth and inspiring future entrepreneurs.
    • “We should want tons of trillionaires … that pie is growing and everybody is going to have the ability to have more.” (12:39)

• Personal Reflections:

  • Clay sees Musk’s journey (from Hillary/Biden voter to conservative champion) as a relatable arc for many listeners, citing how COVID-19 policies “radicalized” him personally.
  • Discusses his own inspirations and aspirations, drawing a parallel to Roger Bannister breaking the 4-minute mile—demonstrating that inspirational milestones often lead to a surge in similar achievements.

• Key Quote:

  • “You don’t build by taking, you build by growing. We need more builders in the United States, frankly.” (14:37)

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3. The Ripple Effects of SpaceX’s Success

(20:16 – 32:55)

• Life-Changing Wealth Creation:

  • “4,400 SpaceX employees became millionaires, including janitors, welders, and hourly workers. 400 became hundred-millionaires.” (20:30)
  • Example: A SpaceX employee earning $28 an hour is now a millionaire thanks to stock options.

• Caller Stories:

  • Darcy (Houston):
    • Relative worked at SpaceX, no college degree, became a multimillionaire—“changed his family tree.”
    • “There’s the pie is not limited. … He helped build it with Elon. And Elon honors that.” (26:45)
  • Michael (Corpus Christi):
    • High school grad, concrete contractor, invested all savings into SpaceX in 2019; now holds $15M in stock.
    • “Every dime I own I saved and put into SpaceX since 2019. … I ended up with $900,000 in there. And right now I’m looking at a little over $15 million.” (27:48–28:13)

• Generational Impact:

  • Clay emphasizes how such wealth isn’t just life-changing for individuals, but for families across generations—contrast to politicians who “haven’t built anything” (refers to politicians like Bernie Sanders and AOC only making themselves millionaires).

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4. Capitalism vs. Redistribution: The Moral Question

(32:55 – 45:17)

• Is Greed in Building or in Taking?

  • Clay challenges the notion that building wealth is greedy, arguing instead that confiscatory policies (taking wealth from those who’ve created it) are the real greed.
    • “Who’s the greedy person? The person who built their wealth and built companies and made a ton of other people wealthy, or the person who says, I’m going to take from you?” (30:20)
    • “Bernie Sanders has created one millionaire in his life. Bernie Sanders. AOC … created one millionaire. Elizabeth Warren … created one millionaire.” (31:02)

• Wealth Creation Is Not Zero-Sum:

  • Callers and Clay insist that wealth is not fixed—“wealth can absolutely be created.”
    • “The most pernicious lie … is that wealth is finite.” (Caller Jim, 42:20)
  • Clay uses the pizza analogy:
    • “The Democrat party basically sees the world as one slice of pizza. … Entrepreneurs see that and say, let’s make more pies. … The United States, better than anywhere, is expanding the pie.” (43:00)

• Musk’s Wealth, the Broader Benefit:

  • Musk’s “trillionaire” status is largely on paper (stock valuation) and could disappear if the company falters.
  • Shareholders, university endowments (e.g., UNC’s endowment now 10% SpaceX), and workers all benefit from the company’s growth.
    • “If the company's value goes to zero, Musk's trillion dollars vanishes. But if he builds a $20 trillion company, he’s unlocked that for many of us.” (32:55)

• Capital Gains and Taxation:

  • Caller Peter notes: The taxes from capital gains as stock is sold will generate hundreds of billions in tax revenue—another social good often overlooked in political rhetoric. (44:29 – 45:17)

• America as Unique Ground for Builders:

  • Clay: “Could [Elon Musk] have become a trillionaire in any other country in the world? I don’t think so. … The unique environment that we have created mostly by Republicans in this country is the foundation of why Elon Musk became a trillionaire.” (34:41)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• “Graham Platner tweeted, ‘Elon Musk just became the world’s first trillionaire. Let’s make sure he’s also the last.’” — Clay Travis, 06:56

• “We should want tons of trillionaires. … If there are a ton of trillionaires in the United States, then our economy is expanding like crazy and that pie is growing.” — Clay Travis, 12:39

• “You don’t build by taking, you build by growing. We need more builders in the United States.” — Clay Travis, 14:37

• “The only millionaire that Bernie Sanders and AOC have ever created is themselves. They haven’t built anything.” — Clay Travis, 31:02

• “If the company's value goes to zero, Musk’s trillion dollars vanishes. But if he builds a company that is worth $20 trillion, one day, 10 trillion of that’s going to be his, but the other 10 trillion is going to be value that he has unlocked for many of us.” — Clay Travis, 32:55

• “The most pernicious lie that liberals run on against capitalism and billionaire trillionaires is that wealth is finite. … Wealth can absolutely be created.” — Caller Jim (Minnesota), 42:20

• “The Democrat party basically sees the world as one slice of pizza. … Entrepreneurs see that and say, ‘let’s make more pies.’” — Clay Travis, 43:00

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Oil/gas prices, economic update: 02:36 – 06:00
• Elon Musk/SpaceX IPO and party reactions: 06:00 – 12:39
• Capitalism, aspirations, and building vs. taking: 12:39 – 17:41
• Life-changing wealth at SpaceX, employee stories: 20:16 – 29:56
• Musk’s risk-taking, familial impact: 26:23 – 27:04
• Is building greedy? Political comparisons: 30:20 – 32:55
• SpaceX’s broader impact (universities, investors): 32:55 – 34:41
• Unique American environment for builders: 34:41 – 38:56
• Callers on wealth, tax, and opportunity: 42:19 – 45:17

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Overall Tone and Style

• Direct, conversational, and occasionally polemical.
• Clay stresses optimism, acknowledges his own prior centrism, and uses vivid metaphors (pies/pizza, breaking the 4-minute mile) to convey the promise of wealth creation.
• Frequent comparisons between individual initiative (exemplified by Musk) and political class inertia.
• Listeners participate by sharing authentic, rags-to-riches stories, reinforcing the episode’s themes.

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Conclusion

This episode presents Elon Musk’s newly minted trillionaire status as a “perfect window” into the divide between political worldviews in America. For Clay Travis, Musk’s story is not just about one man’s wealth, but about the power of risk-taking, ambition, and the unique system of American capitalism to lift up legions of workers, investors, and families. Clay frames the conversation as a choice: “Do we want to take what others have built, or do we want to create an opportunity for others to build?”
The episode is a broadside against redistributive policies, using real-world examples and listener testimonials to champion the doctrine that “you don’t build by taking—you build by growing.”

Transcript

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[Clay Travis]

Welcome in Tuesday edition, Clay and Buck Hope all of you are having fantastic starts to your day. Let's try to make it a little bit better than it otherwise would have been. We have continued plummeting oil and gas prices. They are now down to 75 a barrel. Putting it into perspective, around 70, $68 was the price of oil and gas when the war with Iran started at near the end of February. What does that mean? $3 a gallon gas is coming sooner rather than later. Iran agreement has still not been released. President Trump is in France for the G7. We will follow all of that. Still stocks on the Dow setting another record high today, going over 52,000 on the Dow S&P 500 mixed. But again, biggest story in terms of how your pocketbook is going to be impacted. Oil and gas back down to $75 a barrel, $3 on average. Gallon of gas is on the way and it will be there, I believe by the fall. It will take some time, but you will see those numbers on your local gas stations plummeting rapidly. I was driving around near my house, saw a $3.50 gallon of gas starting to appear all over the suburban Nashville area. And I believe that much of that is going to continue all over the country. Even in California, things will go back to being comparatively affordable. Unfortunately for you, those of you in California, the morons running your state, insist that you pay several dollars oftentimes more per gallon than the average in the rest of the country. So we're going to continue to follow all of that. There's also been, there's a drone plot and charges that have been brought surrounding UFC250. We kind of touched on that a little bit. That is the White House fight that happened on Sunday night. We may get into that during the course of the program a bit. But I wanted to start with this as we are sitting and beginning the show here. SpaceX is right now the they had the biggest stock offering in the history of the United States on Friday. Company went public. SpaceX stock is right now right around 204, 213 a share. Company went public, I believe at 135. It has now got a market cap of 2.79 trillion. One of the biggest companies in the world. There's a lot of optimism surrounding it. And Elon Musk on Friday when this company went public, he has around roughly half of overall SpaceX equity. And so he became a trillionaire when this company went public. And there were a lot of reactions on Friday. I wasn't on with you. I was traveling. I was taking my 11 year old to the US versus Paraguay soccer match. But I was following the stories. I was actually flying from Florida to LA and I had Fox Business up on the screen in front of me because I wanted to kind of follow the story of SpaceX. And I was also on my phone And I was watching what was being said, and I thought, as SpaceX went public on Friday, we actually got a perfect window into what the two respective parties stand for. And there were a lot of different senators upset on the Democrat side who were attacking Elon Musk. But I grabbed one of them because he's been in the news so much. Graham Platner, who is now the nominee for the Democrat Party. He's got a sordid background. I'm sure we'll be talking about it a lot, Buck and I will, between now and when we actually get to the midterms. Buck, by the way, out with his family again today. He is scheduled to be back on Thursday. So you got me today and tomorrow as well. And I think Buck will be back with us on Thursday. I, by the way, will be up in D.C. on Wednesday and Thursday. So I'll be in our D.C. studios there. But Graham Plattner tweeted, elon Musk just became the world's first trillionaire. Let's make sure he's also the last. Now, there's obviously an implicit threat here, because unfortunately, in this era in which we live, there are a great deal of threats that are constantly being levied against many people that are on the right. Even though Elon voted for Hillary Clinton, I believe he may have voted. I'm pretty sure that he voted for Joe Biden. Elon didn't vote Republican until 2024. He is just on the path that actually a lot of you out there are on. The one that I was on, Buck was super conservative when he was 12. Uh, I was not. It took me actually going through what life is like, and then, frankly, Covid radicalized me in a way that I still am not comfortable with. What happened in Covid. I'm still angry about it, but I would say I was several years ahead of the path that Elon Musk himself has ended up on. And that, frankly, many of you listening to us right now have, have gone through and been on. But Elon Musk just became the world's first trillionaire. Let's make sure he's also the last. So let's just pretend that there isn't an implicit threat against Elon there. And let's just focus on what Graham Platner said, because I think it's illustrative of the modern Democrat Party. And it's very important to think about it, the context here. We should want tons of trillionaires. When I see that Elon Musk became the world's first trillionaire, I talked to my oldest son who is very entrepreneurial and Elon Musk is in many ways his idol, his hero, his aspirational figure in the public eye that he would look up to. And he said, boy, I would like to be a trillionaire one day. Should it? We want Elon Musk to be the first of many trillionaires. I think it's an extraordinary success story that Elon Musk decided, hey, I want to spend send rockets to space better than anyone ever has before in the history of mankind. I think I can build a company that is better at sending rockets to space than NASA is. And he did it despite the fact that NASA had around a 70 some odd year head start on him. He also redesigned the way that we propel cars with electric. Awesome. I told you. I bought a Tesla. I love it. I let itself drive me. I let it self drive my family. I drove to Knoxville, Tennessee recently. I was talking about how awesome Buc EE's is. I stopped and plugged in and charged my Tesla at the crazy buc EE's that all the European visitors are just blown away by how incredible it is. The Democrat Party in general, they want to look at the world as one big pie that is not growing. And they just want to take from others, meanwhile the Elon Musk's of the world. And I think many of you out there, and certainly I would put myself in this category. We want to build a bigger piece. We believe that the way for everyone to have a better life is not to be envious of the existing pie and reallocate the slices as if there's never going to be any more. I'm going to take what I get you are not able to ever get. It's a constant battle for resources that are never growing. What the Republican Party looks at, it says we should, we should make bigger pies. Everyone in the entire country should get a bigger slice of prosperity. The way we do that is by growing. And the Democrat Party is very fixed. They have this idea that all of the wealth that's ever going to exist is here now and it's just a big fight over that limited pile. And how do we reallocate the resources? And I, I also think there's just a poor job of communication in general that Republicans do. Some people will say Elon Musk got a trillion dollars. He's greedy. Why is it greedy to want to keep your money, but it's not greedy to try and take someone else's money. It's really interesting when you think about it. From A communication perspective, isn't it? We out there who see Elon Musk as the first trillionaire and think, boy, I hope there's tons of kids out there that look at the economic success that Elon Musk has done and they think to themselves, I want to do that too. If Elon can do it, maybe one day I can do it too. Seeing someone do something spectacular is often what propels other humans to engage in incredible success. There's a lot of examples of this, but one of my favorite is Roger Banister. Nobody could break a four minute mile. Roger Bannister finally did it. As soon as Bannister did it, a bunch of other people did too. Why? Because the belief that you could do it once you saw someone do it, many people out there thought, oh, I can do that too. Aspiration. Seeing success is a huge part of being successful. I've written five books. When I was a kid, I used to go into bookstores and I would go to the section of the bookstore where my last name was and I would think, oh, that's where my book would be. On the bookshelves right here. I'd go down to the letter T. I would go down right through and I would think, one day my book is going to be right here. Visualizing and believing in success is a huge part of being successful. Taking your kids to go to a book signing, like my mom and dad did back in the day, seeing an author, oh, he did this. Oh, she did this. I can do this too one day. Democrats look at the success of Elon Musk and they think, we must take from him and give to others. Republicans see the success of Elon Musk and they think, and I hope you're raising your kids and your grandkids like this. You could do this to one day. Graham Platner says, let's make sure he's the last trillionaire. I think, let's make sure that Elon Musk is the first of many trillionaires. I would love if a generation from now there were 30American trillionaires, or 40 or 50 or 1,000. Because if there are a ton of trillionaires in the United States, then our economy is expanding like crazy and that pie is growing and everybody is going to have the ability to have more. You don't build by taking, you build by growing. We need more builders in the United States, frankly. We need more politicians who have an entrepreneurial mindset and think about building instead of merely reallocating that which has already built. And so I don't know how many people have seen these quotes and really thought about them in depth. But I think it's a perfect distillation of where the parties are. We want to take what others have built. That's the Democrat Party. We want to create an opportunity for others to build as Elon Musk has built. That's the Republican Party. It's a sin. It's a really important distinction. And I thought on Friday, as we saw Elon Musk become the first trillionaire, how people responded to that is actually a perfect window into the souls of the party. All right, we'll open up phone lines, by the way, 800-282-2882. We will also continue to roll through, keep you updated on everything having to do with Iran and we'll continue to follow, hopefully Elon Musk's path onto multi trillionaire status. But I want to tell you, if you are like me and you have run small businesses in your life, if you have been involved in the past in having to deal with so many different challenges, I mean, my goodness, I know exactly what you are going through and how challenging that can be. Super sure handles all of your insurance needs. It is going to be a very, very easy to follow concept. And if you are out there right now and you're like, man, I got so many insurance policies, I don't even know what's covered. I don't even know if I'm paying the right amount. I don't even know if I've got the right coverage because there's so many different moving parts. Just trust me on this. Go to super sure.com clay right now if you got 25 or more employees, this is right in your wheelhouse. They will get everything taken care of you. One powerful platform, one super agency super sure.com clay they will let you know, do you have the right insurance coverage? 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[Clay Travis]

Welcome back in Clay and Buck. A lot of reactions rolling in. And I do think the Elon Musk trillionaire story is one of the greatest in the history of the United States. We have a guy who comes in and I didn't even say this in the open, but I do think this is pretty, pretty substantial. 4400 people became millionaires who had been SpaceX employees, including janitors, welders, people who were working for hourly wages. I saw the story of a guy who was making $28 an hour, is now a millionaire because he got SpaceX stock. 400 people became hundred millionaires. Think about this for a minute. Elon Musk could already buy everything that he ever wanted to for the rest of his life. I don't know exactly what the dollar figure is, but certainly if you are a billionaire, you can buy pretty much anything that you would ever want for the rest of your life. Elon Musk becoming a trillionaire doesn't change his life. Certainly when you're worth hundreds of billions of dollars and you become a trillionaire, there's nothing in terms of physical possession that's going to change Elon Musk's life. You know whose life changes? The guys and gals who became millionaires. The guys and gals who became hundred millionaires. That's a difference between living paycheck to paycheck and having generational wealth that you're going to be able to leave to your family, that you're going to be able to potentially use to found another company. We come back, I want to talk about that because think about this. Elon Musk made a hundred million dollars from, from PayPal. He was one of the initial founders of PayPal. Most people, if they make a hundred million dollars, they say, hey, you know what, I'm going to live an easy life. I'm not going to try to do anything else. If we had taxed Elon Musk massively when he made his hundred million dollars, the government might have gotten 50 million of that. But Elon would have never founded SpaceX. He would have never taken over with Tesla. Think about this for a minute. Elon Musk made a hundred million dollars and he pushed, that was the table stakes for him. He pushed all that money into the table and said, hey, I'll raise you. I'm going to try to build rockets, I'm going to try to make new cars. And think of the tens of thousands of jobs that have as a result been created. You guys can weigh in, I'll come back, I'll talk about that a bit more because I do think it's an important story and it's one that should be celebrated by everyone. Elon Musk, greatest capitalist in the history of this country. He couldn't have done what he did anywhere else. If you want to save money, maybe you're not a trillionaire, maybe you're not a billionaire, maybe you're not a millionaire. Maybe you just want unlimited talk text, high speed WI fi for just 34.99amonth. If you use a ton of data on your phone, it's a great deal. My 18 year old, my 15 year old, they both have pure talk phones, Veteran owned company, 250th birthday. They are celebrating and honoring America's history by contributing $250,000 to America's Warrior Partnership. You can join a company that shares your values, the company that provides cell phone service to my family by just taking your existing cell phones. Dial pound two five zero, say Clay and Buck to be connected today. Again, pound two hundred and fifty. You can keep your same phone and your same phone number. That's £250, say clay and Buck. Welcome back in Clay and Buck rolling through the Tuesday edition of the program. And we're talking about, to me, the Elon Musk story is a perfect distillation of what you believe America should represent. Should we have as many trillionaires as possible? Or is Graham Platner right when he says Elon Musk just became the world's first trillionaire? Let's make sure he's also the last. I mean, this I. The fact that you would tweet, that is so awful, it's akin to saying, like, take it outside of economics. Michael Jordan just became the greatest basketball player of all time. Let's make sure no one else is ever anywhere near as good as him. Usain Bolt is the fastest sprinter of all time. Let's make sure no other American is ever as no one else in the world is ever near as fast as he is. Now, they may be uniquely transcendent, incredible athletes, but the athletics to me is a perfect metaphor for the search for a new horizon, a new frontier, a better version of everything. And so when you say let's make sure this wealthy person is the last most wealthy person, what you're really saying is let's stop all economic progress. Jarcy in Houston, you've got a connection to you that was a SpaceX employee and became a multimillionaire. That's a fantastic story. Tell me about it.

[Caller Darcy]

So my cousin, her son started at SpaceX eight to 10 years ago when they were in California. He does not have a college degree. He's one of these people that can build anything. He's just kind of a savant in that way. He was born, she was 19 years old when he was born. This, because he's been there so long, this changed his family tree. I mean, his mom has since remarried and her life is really good. She's a fantastic husband. This husband raised this son. But it just, there's the pie is not limited.

[Clay Travis]

And so, so this. Sorry to cut you off, Darcy. This, this kid, this, that was born to a 19 year old mom sounds like maybe a single Parent that, that remarried is just a super talented kid, goes to work at SpaceX in California, doesn't have a college degree and is now a multimillionaire. Because of the company that Elon Musk built.

[Caller Darcy]

Yeah, because he helped build it with Elon. And Elon honors that. Graham Plantner is never going to honor and give back to the employees that build things with him because he's interested in tearing things down. And people need to understand that's what the Democrat party is all about. They're not building lives and building people up and bringing them along on the journey.

[Clay Travis]

Man, I, I love, I love this story, Darcy. Well, congratulations. I mean, I imagine your, your cousin that she's just walking on air because her son is now a multimillionaire, which is the dream of many people out there that are not wealthy. The reason why you make the sacrifices that you do is so your kids can grow up and have opportunities and successes in life that you do not. Thank you for the call, Darcy. I love it. Michael. Corpus Christi Elon made you a millionaire.

[Caller Michael]

Yes, sir.

[Clay Travis]

Through SpaceX or what is the, what is your connection to, how did your wealth come to be connected? Through Elon?

[Caller Michael]

Yeah, I started investing. I'm a high school graduate, that's it. And I got in the ditch, started digging ditches and become a concrete contractor. And then every dime I own I saved and saved and saved and I put into SpaceX since 2019. And then I ended up with 900,000 in there. And right now I'm looking at little over 15 million.

[Clay Travis]

That's incredible. So were you a contractor with SpaceX? How did you get access to, to be able to buy SpaceX stock?

[Caller Michael]

My security guy that did my cameras and you know, burglary security told me. Tell me about this guy that was doing it at Forte Capital and I called him and he allowed me to invest with him. And I got lucky. I got very, very lucky.

[Clay Travis]

So you put in, you're putting all your savings into it and you now have $15 million in SpaceX stock now that it's gone public.

[Caller Michael]

I have $15 million worth of SpaceX stock. Yes, I have a six month lockup on it.

[Clay Travis]

Yep. That is awesome. Congrats. Congratulations. Well, what are you planning on doing? So you have a six month lockup. That's common for people who don't know if you got insider shares, you have to hold on to them for a while. What are you planning on doing? Are you gonna sell the stock? Are you gonna stick with it? What's your game plan? Now that you have $15 million in, in stock that in six months you could sell or you could do whatever you want with.

[Caller Michael]

I'm going to try to avoid as much status as I can, but

[LingoKids Advertiser/Professional Wrestling Fan]

I'd

[Caller Michael]

like to get a little ranch somewhere here in Texas and enjoy life.

[Clay Travis]

Thank you. Thank you for the call.

[Caller Michael]

More with and put it all in my grandkids name.

[Clay Travis]

That's awesome. How old is your, how many grandkids do you have?

[Caller Michael]

I have two. One is just in the year and one at six years old.

[Clay Travis]

That is awesome. Well, thank you for the call, Michael. Congratulations. Think about that. We got just two different calls. Elon Musk, 4400 millionaires. Those are the employees. There's no telling how many people have also ended up with stock. 400 hundred millionaires. The only millionaire that Bernie Sanders and AOC have ever created is themselves. They haven't built anything. Graham Platner is living off of his dad's wealth. His daddy bought him his house. Mom made him an oyster farmer. Her restaurant is what allows him to be able to claim to be an oyster farmer. People who haven't built anything are saying as a point of pride, let's go take what other people have built. And again, I would just ask you to think about it. People say, oh, Elon Musk is greedy. He built wealth. Who's the greedy person? The person who built their wealth and built companies and made a ton of other people wealthy, or the person who says, I'm going to take from you? How is it greedy to build something? It's not greedy to take something. To me, if I had to classify who the greedy person is, it would be the person who shows up and tries to take, not the person who builds. Think about that. Bernie Sanders has created one millionaire in his life. Bernie Sanders, AOC has created one millionaire in her life. Aoc, Elizabeth Warren has created one millionaire in their life. In her life. Elizabeth Warren just on Friday. There's probably more now because the stock has gone up. 4400 millionaires created with SpaceX. 400, 100 millionaires. Just in the calls on this program, you've heard from two different people who know either themselves or family members who have became millionaires or multimillionaires. Chuck in Edmond, Oklahoma, you got a good take here. What you got for us?

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Sure.

[Caller Michael]

I don't know the point. I,

[Clay Travis]

I don't know what happened to Chuck. Chuck's point was going to be that Musk isn't putting his 1 trillion under the masket. Under the, the, under the Mattress. He's trying to build trillions of dollars more in value. A hundred billion percent. Right. It's a trillion percent. Right. Musk's money, first of all, isn't tangible cash.

[Caller Michael]

Right.

[Clay Travis]

It's a value of the company. If the company's value goes to zero, Musk's trillion dollars vanishes. But if he builds a company that is worth $20 trillion, one day, 10 trillion of that's going to be his. But the other 10 trillion is going to be value that he has unlocked for many of us. I'm a SpaceX shareholder now. I'm excited to be a SpaceX shareholder. I hold stock in the 500 largest companies. I invested in SpaceX a couple of years ago. I feel very fortunate to have done well with that myself as an investor. But many different people out there. Yeah, I saw a crazy stat you might be saying, okay, well, I don't know how it impacts me. The University of North Carolina, go Tar Heels. The University of North Carolina, I saw a stat saying they invested in SpaceX. It's now 10% of the overall endowment of the University of North Carolina. Think about how crazy that is. The endowment of the University of North Carolina, the SpaceX stock that they have, the investment that they gave to Elon Musk, has grown to such an extent that right now, that is where the endowment is blown up in a great way. Probably they're going to be able to spend money to make the University of North Carolina a better university than it otherwise would be. And there are tons of universities out there. Let me put it in a context for you this way. Every single year I work for the federal government into June, that is every day you hear me talking until we get to mid to late June, I'm not getting a single dollar in my pocket. Every dollar that I make goes straight to the federal government. So if you're upset at anything that I said in January, February, March, April, May, June, take it up with the federal government. Cause they're the ones that got paid for everything that I said in all those months. I gave Elon Musk a dollar, he's going to give me back 12 or $13. I gave the federal government half my dollars that I make in a year. I get nothing back. What would you rather do? Would you rather have the opportunity to grow your wealth and have the pie expand in a massive way where people from all different walks of life are going to become millionaires and multi millionaires and changing their life? You just heard one of our callers say he's got A six year old grand, I think it was a granddaughter and a six year old grandson. Two grandkids, six year old and a one year old. Think about how much their life is changing because he invested in Elon Musk. He said he's gonna hopefully be able to pass it on to his grandkids. They're gonna be able to do things, those grandbabies of his that they never would have been able to do. If Elon Musk doesn't come to America and found the companies that he did. And nobody's talking about this, but I do think this is pretty consequential. Elon Musk became a trillionaire in the United States. Could he have become a trillionaire in any other country in the world? I don't think so. Be a great question for Elon. To what extent does he attribute his ability to becoming a trillionaire to the unique dynamic marketplace of the United States that embraces fear, that embraces fearlessness and risk taking in a way that much of the rest of the world doesn't. How much of the dynamic marketplace of tech existing in the United States made SpaceX and Tesla, Neuralink and Starlink and all these other different companies the boring company. How much of the unique environment that we have created mostly by Republicans in this country is the foundation of why Elon Musk became a trillionaire? I just, I love everything about this story and I actually don't think it's being talked about enough or explain why it is so significant. Loaded lines. I'll take a bunch of your calls and we come back, but I want to tell you about the newest sponsor on this program, and it's viome. 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[Clay Travis]

A ton of you want to weigh in on our discussion today about El Musk becoming a trillionaire and the fact that Graham Platner, among others, has attacked him becoming a trillionaire and says let's make sure he's the last trillionaire Jim in Minnesota, fire away.

[Caller Michael]

Hey. Hey.

[Caller Jim]

Thanks for taking my call. The most pernicious lie that liberals run on against capitalism and billionaire trillionaires is that wealth is finite. That that is just an absolute dangerous line of thinking. You know, wealth can absolutely be created. I mean, just look at 250 years of the country. How much more wealth and resources and goods and services do we have now? You know, they just, Graham Platner is buying into the same nonsense. So yeah, I just, just wanted to mention that wealth can absolutely be created.

[Clay Travis]

Thank you. I think that's so important in the way that I would explain it because a lot of times big numbers can be complicated and hard to understand. And I think about this with trying to explain to my kids how to think about money. Think about it as a pie. I just think it's so easy to think about if you've ever had a bunch of kids over for a pizza party, or maybe you've got a bunch of kids yourself and you see them rush to a pizza and there's eight or 10 slices in that pizza and if once they're gone, there's no more left. What we want to create as a country is a constantly expanding pie. So instead of everybody, the Democrat party basically sees the world as one slice of pizza. It's not growing one big pizza. And if you get a slice, that's something that somebody else doesn't get. That way of thinking is basically that resources are scarce and that more of them cannot be created entrepreneurs see that and say, well, instead of fighting over these existing slices, let's make more pies. And the United States, better than anywhere is expanding the pie. And that's why we all as a group live and have more resources today than we have at any point in the past 250 years of our country. Let's see Peter in Daytona Beach, Florida. Fire away.

[Caller Peter]

Hey, how's it going? Glad to be on here. Hey, I'm an active trader and I one thing that the Democrats aren't talking about is short term capital gains. I mean, just on a trillion dollars Elon's tax liabilities, over $75 billion in tax generation, let alone all of the people that they turn into a millionaire, that's going to come close some of their positions and they're going to end up having to pay tax on that. I mean.

[Clay Travis]

Yeah, thank you for the call. Yes, when you sell the stock, it becomes a realized gain and you have capital gains tax ramifications. It is likely the case that probably hundreds of billions of dollars in capital gains taxes will ultimately be paid from people who made huge amounts of money from SpaceX.

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