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- [00:00]
Trevor Noah
This message is a paid partnership with Apple Card. One of my favorite things to have on hand these days is my Apple Card. It's made to be simple and private and getting it was pretty simple too. It takes minutes to apply. Check your credit limit offer and start using it right away. With Apple Pay, you could apply for it while waiting in line to get coffee and then use it to buy your coffee. I also like that you can get up to 3% daily cash back on every purchase, which can be put into a high yield savings account that you can open through Apple Card so you can really put your money to work. Apply in the wallet app on your iPhone and start using Apple Card right away. Subject to credit approval, Savings is available to Apple Card owners subject to eligibility. Savings and Apple Card by Goldman Sachs Bank USA Salt Lake City Branch Member FDIC to terms and more@applecard.com I think people sometimes take for granted that a scam artist doesn't necessarily fail. Right? You know, we were talking to one of my producers earlier, and we're like, 10 years ago today, Elon Musk said he was like, in 10 years, we will be on Mars. He's like, I'll do it. We're gonna be on Mars. We're still here, baby. You know what I mean? Yeah. Okay. Trump's a simple one. What did Trump say? Never forget, he said, day one, we're gonna bring down the price of eggs. They're coming down, folks. We're gonna bring it down. They've done nothing. They've done nothing. Eggs have only gone up since he came into power. And now what's his story? Biden left me with bad egg prices. You said day one. You said day one. And you said, you're gonna do this thing. Not only have you not done it, it's gotten worse. The stock market is taking tank. This is what now with Trevor Noah. This episode is brought to you by Brooklinen. Your bedroom is not just the place where you sleep. Let's be honest, it's your sanctuary. And as we head into spring, it's time to freshen things up and level up. Think about the you that you want to be this spring. Breezier lighter with a little bounce in your step. Well, believe it or not, that can all start with a bedroom refresh. Yeah, leave the bulky, drab winter days behind and make you a better space for lighter textures and warmer vibes. Before you know it, spring will be here and you'll be easing into the new season. Shop award winners and fan faves in store or online@brooklinen.com that's B R O O K L I N E N and use the code Trevor for 15% off your online order of $100 or more. That's Brooklinen.com use promo code Trevor for.
- [02:53]
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- [03:12]
Max Chefkin
You.
- [03:12]
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- [03:28]
Trevor Noah
Max Chefkin, welcome to the podcast.
- [03:30]
Max Chefkin
Thank you for having me.
- [03:31]
Trevor Noah
You know, what I love about what you do is, I mean, you're deeply ingrained in the world of reporting around finance and business and tech and everything, but I'm oftentimes amused and enthralled by people who seem to be in a place where they were well ahead of something before other people saw it. And I wonder sometimes if it's luck or if it's them having a premonition. You host a podcast called Elon Inc. And I remember the first time I saw the podcast, I was like, huh? I was like, wow, is there gonna be enough material?
- [04:08]
Max Chefkin
We had the same concern.
- [04:10]
Trevor Noah
Oh, you did?
- [04:10]
Max Chefkin
I mean, to some extent, ye. Or there were definitely people around it who wondered. But of course, it's turned out, it's worked out. Like you said, Elon Musk is everywhere right now. Even before he was involved with Donald Trump, we were making this argument like, no, you don't understand. He's this big cultural figure. He's a mega billionaire. He has more influence than maybe anyone on the planet. And then, of course, he became obviously very closely linked to Donald Trump, became his number one campaign donor and de facto, you know, senior advisor, or however you want to think of it. It does feel, yeah, like we're ahead of something. On the other hand, I think even people who have been following this man for a really long time, and I met him, I think, for the first time in, like, 2007. So I've been covering him for many, many years. Even. So it's been very surprising to watch the kind of transformation over the last couple years and then what's happened over the last, you know, four or five months.
- [05:12]
Trevor Noah
Right. The reason I really wanted to have you on so that we could chat with you today is because I think it's easy to make the conversation about Elon Musk and for us to like hyper focus on it, because it's happening right now. But what I think, where I think you're uniquely positioned is because of your expertise. I think you can help us paint a picture that gives us a larger idea of what we're experiencing. Because you also wrote Many People Argue, like the definitive biography on Peter Thiel. Right. And now I've learned a lot of people, you say Peter Thiel, they're like, what's that like a lot of people you say Peter Thiel and they go, what is that? And then some people really know the name and some people don't. And the people who know it sometimes will say, oh, forget Elon Musk. Peter Thiel is the puppet master who's running all of this. So I guess to set the scene for this conversation, when we talk about the technocrats or the tech elites or the tech, like, who are we actually speaking about? So it's like Elon Musk, Peter Thiel. Who would you count in that echelon?
- [06:18]
Max Chefkin
I would add Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, and then I would throw in some other investors. Marc Andreessen, probably a name that is less familiar to people, but the founder of Netscape, who's now a major venture capitalist, also advising Trump right now. And then there's this kind of like larger universe of guys who are connected to Thiel who are involved in politics at the moment. David Sachs, who's like running Trump's AI and crypto initiatives. And it's sort of a list of venture capitalists and so on. What actually made this kind of helpful in investigating it is that Thiel and his cohort, you know, call themselves the PayPal mafia. They actually like, they self identify. Yeah, as an influence network. And Elon Musk, he started a company in the dot com during the dot com bubble and then started a company that merged with PayPal, effectively became like a co founder of PayPal. So he was in that PayPal mafia, although he and Thiel were kind of like rival sort of friends, frenemies. Over a number of years, Thiel invested in his companies, Musk invested in Thiel's hedge fund. There's a lot of sort of back scratching or whatever going on in this world. And the way I see it, Thiel was a prominent backer of Donald Trump in 2016. He was kind of the first tech guy to back Trump to say, yeah, this is the guy. He spoke at the RNC the Republican National Convention, he donated a little more than a million dollars in October of 2016. That was after the Access Hollywood thing.
- [07:58]
Trevor Noah
Wow.
- [07:59]
Max Chefkin
And then joined the Trump administration, or joined the transition anyway, with this idea of attacking the quote, unquote, administrative state, which is really similar to what Elon Musk is trying to do right now with Doge. Yeah, exactly. When I wrote that book on Thiel, he had kind of all these secret connections with various, like, right wingers. And Thiel was operating kind of behind the scenes. And you're looking at, like, oh, did he consort with this extremist or that extremist? And he was sort of playing footsie with the far right.
- [08:32]
Trevor Noah
Yeah.
- [08:32]
Max Chefkin
Musk is just supercharging it. Right. So it's just this kind of, like, dramatic acceleration of what these tech guys have been up to for a very long time.
- [08:43]
Guest
I'd like to go back before you started the podcast. Why, Elon? Why did you. What made you feel that this is the guy to dig into?
- [08:51]
Max Chefkin
I mean, so just at the most basic level, he is. I mean, he's either the world, depending on the day, right? He's now far and away the world's richest person, but at various times, he's been like, top two, top three. He's one of the wealthiest people on the planet. He owns two very important companies. Tesla Motors, he's a significant shareholder. And Tesla Motors CEO, effectively controls company. Tesla is the most valuable car company. It is, you know, the leading player in electric cars. So in certain ways, you know, the leading player for the future of cars. He also owns this gigantic defense contractor, SpaceX, which is the leading provider of rocket launch services to satellite players and to the U.S. government. And he's got a bunch of other little companies. And then he has this, as I said earlier, like, this. This cultural impact. It's not just that Musk is rich and, you know, controls a lot of people's livelihoods. People are really into him. I mean, he has a story that has captivated, to some extent, the world. Right. There's, like, a lot of young people who look up to him, who want to be him. And then you layer on top of that, of course, his penchant for being weird. He has crazy beliefs. He has this complicated, very, very complicated and involved personal and romantic life or whatever. As a father of, you know, 14 children that we know of, maybe, you know, who knows, perhaps? And he's always been, you know, right at the edge of doing what is reasonable. People who are coming to it fresh are like, well, what happened to Elon Musk. And people have been covering Elon Musk for a long time are like, well, like, let me tell you, like, when he, like, fake acquire, like, fake. Did a fake private offer and had a huge fight with the sec, and then, you know, sort of kind of told the SEC to suck Elon's cock. And, like, you can kind of go back, like, he's always been this incredibly. I don't know, for lack of a better word, like, edgy figure.
- [10:48]
Guest
Even as far back as 2007, when you first met him.
- [10:52]
Max Chefkin
Yeah, and I think that's part of why. I mean, there are all sorts of reasons, like, why he became successful. But I think, like, Donald Trump, he has a knack for, like, authenticity and for being willing to sort of say things that seem transgressive and then using that to his advantage. Just like Trump, I mean, he rails against the media all the time, but he got incredible media coverage. Because during those years, like, if you were a reporter, he would. You know, he talked to everybody and he would say crazy stuff. He would attack his enemies. He would. Yeah. Now, back then, his enemies weren't like George Soros. They were just like, BYD or. No, it was like the Cars columnist for the Wall Street Journal. But so it would just be like, somebody, some random blogger, whatever he'd be mad at. And so he was always. He's always saying provocative stuff, and I think that contributed to his rise.
- [11:50]
Trevor Noah
Okay, help me understand this, though. Have we missed something in Silicon Valley shift? Because it seems like there was a time when Silicon Valley was the bastion of progressivism and liberalism. You know, it was Elon Musk himself. He's got, like, tweets where he's out there proudly being like. And that's why we have LGBTQ protections or our workers, and we believe in this. And we. Silicon Valley seemed like that place. It was the place where people came together and said, we want the world to be a better place. I remember when Uber was launching, and they were like, hey. And it was correct. It was saying, like, yeah, now if you're a black person or a person with disabilities, this car will pick you up. You're not gonna now get driven past. And it felt like this utopia crew that was trying to make the world a better place. And so because of that, they were often at odds with the people they're in bed with now. You know what I mean? They were the ones who were like, we don't like Nazis. We don't wanna see swastikas on our websites. We're gonna ban you. And we don't want racism and we don't want people separated. Like, did we miss something? Did Silicon Valley shift? Or was this something that was always there, that is now rearing its head? I don't know which way to look at it.
- [13:03]
Max Chefkin
It's both. So going back to the beginning of the industry, Silicon Valley, people talk about the military industrial complex. That phrase like that is Silicon Valley. That's what Silicon Valley was. It was a bunch of companies that were making technology to help the United States win the Cold War. And like, so you rewind the clock like way back. And this was like a conservative place. This was not a place full of progressives. It was a place that, you know, a lot of ways was kind of like, you know, pro military and so on. And I think that strain has always been there. The kind of conservative or even kind of borderline reactionary strain has always been in this part of California. But of course there's also the counterculture and those two things sort of swirl together. There was a moment during the 2000s when like you're saying, like Silicon Valley seemed very closely allied with the Democratic Party and in particular Barack Obama. You know, I listened to your podcast about Elon from September.
- [14:05]
Trevor Noah
Yeah.
- [14:05]
Max Chefkin
And Trevor, you said, and I think you were kidding, like Obama did this to us. And I think you were right, although not exactly. I would tell a different story, which is that Obama, I'd say more than any politician, maybe more than any cultural figure, is the one who gave us that story about Elon Musk in particular. Oh, so like Obama, you know, this vision of kind of a centrist, forward looking progressivism that embraces tech and the future. He really embraced Elon Musk. He embraced clean technology. Tesla nearly went bankrupt during the financial crisis. Elon Musk got a big loan from the Department of Energy, effectively was saved from bankruptcy by Elon Musk's own admission by Barack Obama, by the Obama administration.
- [14:58]
Trevor Noah
Can we just pause there for a second and say this is probably one of the things that I find I'm most amused and frustrated by is how many times these guys stories are littered with them being helped by the government that they're telling people they need to dismantle because it helps people.
- [15:17]
Guest
Fancy welfare.
- [15:18]
Trevor Noah
It's the craziest thing ever. Like, listen, literally listen to what you just said to me.
- [15:22]
Max Chefkin
I mean, SpaceX, his rocket company, I mean, basically all of its money early on came from the government. And SpaceX, like their big breakthrough was signing this contract with NASA to provide launch Services to the International Space Station. Also an Obama era thing. You know, when you add up the amount of money that they've taken from the government over the years, it's enormous. But it wasn't just that. I mean, Obama put Musk kind of at the center of his idea for what the future should look like. And I also think Silicon Valley, these venture capitalists, these guys who are thinking about the future, they are really good at picking up the vibes. And so they saw that a lot of people were excited about Barack Obama, that he was filling up stadiums, that young people were excited. That's their game. And they said, oh, let's move there. And I think something kind of similar happened this summer with Donald Trump, where they sort of sensed that this is where the vibe was heading.
- [16:24]
Trevor Noah
They also have data that we can't dream of. Right?
- [16:26]
Max Chefkin
Yeah, it's true. Although I'm always skeptical, like, how good the data actually is. Really? Yeah, I mean, they definitely. They're definitely people who are driven by data, But I think these guys make decisions pretty much the same way the rest of us do. Although when they, like, turn back and tell the story, they maybe use a little bit.
- [16:42]
Trevor Noah
Oh, they'll try and. Okay, okay, okay.
- [16:45]
Max Chefkin
So, yeah, and, you know, after the election, after this last election, you know, and we had the inauguration in, like, all these tech guys had better seats than, like, the governor of Florida. Yeah, yeah, yeah. A lot of the guys who are associated with Trump now were associated with Obama. Some of the same people were at the inauguration in, you know, 2024, were the 2008 inauguration.
- [17:05]
Trevor Noah
See, this is so funny because look at some of the conversations we've had on the podcast, like, where Josh says as a joke, but he says it as a real thing. He goes like, trump is white Obama. And he goes like.
- [17:15]
Guest
Not a very controversial comment.
- [17:16]
Trevor Noah
Yeah, a very controversial comment. But it's like, yeah, but you see, like, we talk about the overlapping voters now. You've just thrown in another piece of the puzzle where it's like, oh, the fact that these are the same guys sitting in both these administrations could not be further apart, further apart from each other. You tell me any world you know better than anyone. Like, think about in African countries, when they switch a regime, you will definitely not see the same people sitting behind the new leader, because that's a signal that, like, no, no, no, These are my people and these people. But, like, the fact that they've done that either tells us that there's an overlap in the Trump and Obamaness that they can resonate with or it tells us that they're masterminds at getting into somebody. But they weren't sitting with Joe Biden.
- [18:03]
Max Chefkin
They hated Biden. And I think, why. And I think to some extent, the feeling maybe was mutual. I mean, Biden, unlike George W. Bush, Obama, and even Donald Trump, did not embrace Silicon Valley. I mean, he did because he's a politician and they have, like, the most money in the world. But, you know, his politics was the politics of organized labor and, you know, American manufacturing. And, like, when.
- [18:32]
Trevor Noah
He's an Amtrak man.
- [18:33]
Max Chefkin
He's an Amtrak man. Exactly. And he actually, he sensed, like, correctly, to some extent, that there was a backlash against these tech guys. And Trump, too. Right. Like, Trump was threatening to throw Mark Zuckerberg in prison.
- [18:47]
Trevor Noah
Yeah.
- [18:47]
Max Chefkin
Like, just a few months ago, shut down Google. Biden was, you know, was. Was more skeptical of the tech people, including Elon Musk. And, you know, when Biden was promoting EVs, he made this very concerted effort to promote, you know, GM and Ford, the two big American companies. They have union labor. And that, like, really offended Elon Musk.
- [19:14]
Trevor Noah
So I've always wondered, are you familiar with the story?
- [19:17]
Guest
Part of it. Tell it again.
- [19:18]
Trevor Noah
I've often wondered if this is part of the reason we have the Elon Musk we have today, because Biden holds a summit at the White House, an EV summit, and he invites all the big car manufacturers to the White House, but he doesn't invite Elon Musk. And I don't care what you say about it.
- [19:40]
Guest
Was it a deliberate slight?
- [19:41]
Trevor Noah
I mean, come on. How can it not be? And if you look at. I don't care what you say about politics. Right. Let's go back to that time. I think that is a terrible move because. Say what you want, Elon Musk has done more to push EVs than any other human being. Right. In terms of, like, that position that he's in.
- [20:02]
Max Chefkin
Yeah, yeah. Certainly more than, like, the CEO of.
- [20:06]
Trevor Noah
That's what I mean. Than the CEO of Ford and gm. And so it was strange to me that he did that. But I. I often wonder if that was the moment, because I remember seeing a shift after that where Elon went from being the guy who's like, I don't get involved in politics. And I just think that it's good for us to look at both sides and try to find ourselves in a space where we're not exactly looking at, like, what has happened. And he was that guy.
- [20:27]
Guest
Yeah.
- [20:28]
Trevor Noah
Biden doesn't invite him to the White House. This man went full Trump. I mean, he went. And you watch it intensely. So as a casual observer, do you think that that was a seminal moment in the Musk that we get today?
- [20:42]
Max Chefkin
I think that is. That was kind of the beginning of this version of Musk. And of course, there are other stories. Like, again, the story that you all talked about about Musk's, you know, trans daughter and Musk's own, like, sort of his person. I think all that also applies. But in terms of, if you're looking for, like, a political act, that was it. I mean, that was the moment. And I do think all of those other personal things also. Covid restrictions, you know, Musk got really mad about the closure orders. It was affecting his bottom line, played into it. You know, I do understand why Biden did not invite him. The thing Biden was trying to do was bring the rest of the auto industry into EVs. And in certain ways, that was what Musk was trying to do. You know, way back in the day, there was a version of Elon Musk, you know, 10 or 15 years ago, who would have looked at that and said, oh, my God, that's great. Like, I have achieved my goal. It's not just Tesla, it's everybody.
- [21:40]
Guest
And so you felt that was like an ideological impulse that was maybe environmental. He really believed electric cars are better for the planet.
- [21:49]
Max Chefkin
That's that. If you had asked me, yeah, like 10 years ago. I mean, that was the. That was his ideology. To the extent that he had an ideology, it was. It was bringing electric cars and bringing the industry along with him. And at times, he had actually been kind of friendly with people at gm because gm, of course, had also done some electric cars. They actually released an electric car in the 90s and then killed it. I think Biden was trying to. I mean, and this is the account that the Biden people have given in explanation to sort of defend themselves from the argument that you're making, which is there are definitely a lot of people who agree with you, which is like, listen, this was about. This was about Detroit and everything.
- [22:27]
Trevor Noah
I don't believe that.
- [22:27]
Max Chefkin
But, yeah, I mean, I'll be honest with you.
- [22:29]
Trevor Noah
I don't believe it. I think Biden's people were going, we're gonna put you in your place, and we're gonna show you that this industry's gonna move on without you. And so we're gonna bring all these people in to go, like, we got this. And then Elon Musk, if there's one thing I've seen from Elon Musk and what I've heard about. Yo, let me tell you something. That man does not take slight.
- [22:46]
Guest
Well, yeah.
- [22:48]
Trevor Noah
We're gonna continue this conversation right after this short break.
- [22:53]
Ad
This episode is brought to you by Altra Running. Altra makes performance running shoes that are insanely comfortable with a roomy toe box and zero to low drop. This helps keep your feet in a more natural position so you can move how you were designed to. Perfect for the road, trail or gym. You could wear them for miles and forget that they're there. Stay out there with Altra. Try Altra for yourself with a free 30 day trial and free shipping@altra running.com.
- [23:19]
Trevor Noah
This episode is brought to you by Amazon. Have you ever gotten sick on a very expensive, very non refundable family trip? Amazon One Medical has 247 virtual care so you can get help no matter where you are. And with Amazon Pharmacy, your meds can get delivered right to your hotel fast. It's kind of like the room service of medical care. Thanks to Amazon Healthcare just got less painful. Maybe we should talk about that a little bit more to like take a step out of the Elon of it all. I know the world has often been populated by, you know, you always call them the thin skinned, powerful men.
- [24:05]
Guest
Yeah.
- [24:06]
Trevor Noah
I don't know that we've ever been in a time when the men have had this much power and their skins have been.
- [24:12]
Guest
And this much wealth. Like this is an unprecedented amount of wealth to accumulate. It just wasn't this much money to be hoarded by one person. Right.
- [24:21]
Max Chefkin
Yeah. There's an unsensitive person.
- [24:24]
Guest
Yeah.
- [24:24]
Max Chefkin
Yeah. Unprecedented wealth and kind of an unprecedented cultural impact and control. I mean, Musk. I used to talk about this with Mark Zuckerberg. Facebook, it's the biggest media company in history, you know, but that always felt a little bit hard because clearly Mark Zuckerberg wasn't like going through his mentions, like trying to suspend people who were mean to him, at least not as far as I could tell. Whereas Musk definitely seems to be doing that. Yeah. And so like that feels like the combination of power and control over our cultural lives and money. Like, yeah, that feels new.
- [25:04]
Guest
Yeah. And how much do you think this is fueled by his ketamine use? He's kind of known that is. Don't come from me, Musk. I'm not rich enough to fight that. You ask that, but like, because people are kind of. You read all these articles and it's always an anonymous source. He's like, I've never seen him like this before. This is the most angry or erratic or, you know, the parade when he went to the White House and he brings his kid, you know, like he's doing things that even don't seem typical for somebody who has been known for being pretty eccentric and out there. How much do you think his rumored ketamine use is kind of fueling this behavior?
- [25:45]
Max Chefkin
I mean, he's acknowledged his ketamine use as a treatment for, I believe, depression. I think he said he has a prescription. I don't have any special knowledge about his substance use. I've actually never taken ketamine, so it's sort of hard for me to know exactly. Like, is that, you know. But I do think that he is behaving erratically for him.
- [26:13]
Trevor Noah
No, but you get what I'm saying.
- [26:14]
Max Chefkin
Yeah, I get what you're saying.
- [26:14]
Trevor Noah
Do you think he's behaving erratically for him?
- [26:16]
Max Chefkin
That's a question. Cause he is. He's different. And so it is a little bit hard to like, parse, like, well, how much of this is Elon in a dark place and how much is this Elon? You know, how much of this is whatever substance Elon's taking and how much of it is just like, he's an unusual guy? And I'm not sure that anybody knows the exact answer to that question. Even Elon Musk. I have to say though, the Walter Isaacson book that came out, what was that, like, two years ago? There's a lot in there about his mental well being and admissions from himself and from his own. From people who are very close to him who have been concerned at various points. So, like, I don't think it's totally wrong to like, to, to, to ask, because Musk talks about it himself all the time. I mean, he's somebody who, who is constantly talking about struggles with demons and darkness.
- [27:12]
Trevor Noah
Yeah, he is.
- [27:13]
Max Chefkin
To me, that makes him actually kind of relatable. I mean, that's like a lot of us, you know, everybody struggles and to some extent with demons and darkness or whatever. It's just unusual that he wears it so on his sleeve. Even more so for me than like the, the rumored drug use or whatever, or the actual drug use, like he did once smoke pot on a Joe Rogan podcast or whatever is just the, the hours he's keeping. Right. Like, he seems to be tweeting 24 7.
- [27:41]
Guest
Like, by the way, this man has 14 kids.
- [27:44]
Trevor Noah
Yes.
- [27:44]
Guest
So who's looking after the kids?
- [27:45]
Trevor Noah
Not him. No, not him. You know what it does Bring up for me, though, we talk about unprecedented wealth. There's this idea that I've been playing around with in my head, and I. Because I'm not a clinical psychologist, I'll never say what a person is or isn't. But I find it particularly interesting that Trump, Kanye, and Elon all have very similar trends. If you watch, like, how they are. So they have moments where people go, oh, no, they're lovely, and they're in person. They're charming, and they're this and then that, and then they'll have, like, these, like, sort of outbursts. And all of them have 3am tweet rants. All of them? Yeah, all of them. And people are like, what is happening right now?
- [28:32]
Guest
It's almost manic.
- [28:33]
Trevor Noah
Yeah. Have you seen what Kanye is saying? Have you seen? And then Kanye will come and be like, I'm sorry. And I'm da, da, da, da. We also have very seldom been in a society where that goes, like, unchecked. Do you get what I'm saying? So let's talk about manic, right? I can talk about, like, my grandfather. My grandfather was bipolar. Everything like that, Kanye does. My grandfather did. But my grandfather didn't have billions of dollars. And I don't know what he would have done had he had billions of dollars, because broke was the barrier that caught him every time. And then the family would be like, all right, come fetch your grandfather. He's at the supermarket lecturing people about, blah, blah, blah, gotta go to the supermarket, pick up Granddad. And then tomorrow, he's a sweet little peaceful. But he didn't. You know what I mean? There's a barrier that most people in society will experience when they have whatever it is. These men don't have that. So to your point, like, when Elon's, like, going. Being erratic, when Kanye is being erratic, we don't know what erratic plus billion equals. And I think we might be experiencing it. Do you know what I mean?
- [29:34]
Max Chefkin
Also, I mean, there is this, like, ideological thing that we haven't talked about, which is that these guys. You brought it up with Uber, but, like, they have been in various ways, and Thiel played a big part of this, but Elon has, too, have made this argument that sort of breaking the rules, transgressing, it's not just acceptable. It's like a good thing. It's like a thing we need more of. That, to some extent, is their ideology. And so Uber was, like, breaking the taxi in this. They broke every rule or breaking the rules. And it wasn't just Okay. I think a lot of people prior to this would agree that like, it's okay if a small business doesn't like fill out every single form or whatever, because they're small business. But these guys took it further to say no, like disruption, breaking things, dicking it in the eye of the establishment. Like, that's how progress happens. Like, that is to the extent that any of these guys have really strongly held beliefs, that is the belief that kind of ties them like altogether.
- [30:37]
Trevor Noah
Let's talk more about Peter Thiel. Who, who is this shadowy figure.
- [30:41]
Guest
I find him very scary. When I saw, when I was like prepping for today, I was like, this guy shut down. Gorka. Yeah, he's a scary kind of person.
- [30:50]
Trevor Noah
But that's like, who, who is Peter Thiel? And why do some people consider him the ultimate puppet master for everything that's happening and not.
- [30:59]
Max Chefkin
Not.
- [31:00]
Trevor Noah
By the way, I'm not saying in like conspiracy land. I'm not saying like, who is this mystery? No, I mean more in the way of like someone going, oh, yeah, this is how he helped Trump and this is what he's meant to Elon, et cetera.
- [31:10]
Max Chefkin
Well, so he is, just to start, he is a famous investor. He started co founded PayPal, became kind of like the big tech investor in the 2000s and 2010s. Many of these, many of his friends and colleagues, like Elon Musk, but also Reid Hoffman, co founder of LinkedIn. The guys who started YouTube, they all worked together at PayPal. They all kind of went out in the world and did business together. And Thiel, in addition to all this, was a very conservative person, somebody who had been essentially one of these college conservatives really before it became so cool. So he, and that was really like his first entrepreneurial venture was this kind of right wing newspaper at Stanford called the Stanford Review. And you know, they would like rail against it's basically wokeness. But they, you know, back then they called it like political correctness. Yeah. Culture.
- [32:11]
Trevor Noah
Culture.
- [32:12]
Max Chefkin
And you know, they would sort of like do something that is like right on the line of being racist or sexist or homophobic or maybe all three all at once and then use that to. Yeah. To their advantage. And, and Thiel kind of combined those two things. Combined the, combined his, you know, conservative worldview with his, his business thing. And he's, he's sort of bounced between the two and tried to use his political influence to, to benefit his companies, beginning with Palantir. And this is where some of these like puppet master theories start because Palantir, which is a. It's like a database company that does data mining for. For intelligence agencies and corporations. And Thiel started the company in 2004, and it sort of grew in tandem with his political influence, where they were able to get government contracts and so on as he grew. And of course, Palantir scares people because databases and data mining, there are ways in which you can kind of surveil somebody without actually surveilling them.
- [33:19]
Trevor Noah
Yeah, yeah.
- [33:20]
Max Chefkin
And like I said, he became really the first tech guy to go all in on Trump. And as you.
- [33:28]
Trevor Noah
What did he like about Trump? I'd love to know, like, what he connected to that, you know, because Trump seemed. People forget this now, but I remember when Donald Trump was running for president, he had no ally. Right.
- [33:43]
Guest
So Steve Bannon, that was it.
- [33:45]
Trevor Noah
Right. But Trump was the antithesis of the Republican Party as they saw themselves. You know, I remember, you know, whether it was the people running the RNC or whether it was people who were running against him, they were like, oh, no, no. This guy is a pariah. He's a joke. He does not represent our values. So the establishment Republican Party was not for Donald Trump. The media was not for Donald Trump. Right. Fox News was also like, meh, who is this guy? In that way, the Democrats were not for Donald Trump. Silicon Valley wasn't. So I'd love to know, like, what did Peter Thiel see in Donald Trump where he's like, no, no, no, this is my guy.
- [34:24]
Max Chefkin
Yeah. I mean, that was the mystery that I started with. When I started writing about him, seriously and wrote the book was just like, how does this, you know, he's like a gay immigrant tech guy.
- [34:36]
Trevor Noah
Yes.
- [34:36]
Max Chefkin
Get behind. He's born in Germany, spent some of his childhood in modern day Namibia, I think a short time in South Africa as well. How does this guy, you know, embrace this, like, avowed Luddite? Remember Donald Trump, like, proudly didn't use email, you know, and it's talking about this vision of the country that has nothing to do with Silicon Valley.
- [34:58]
Trevor Noah
Yes.
- [34:58]
Guest
And I think about the miners, like, bring back miners.
- [35:00]
Max Chefkin
More coal miners.
- [35:01]
Trevor Noah
Yeah, we're bringing back coal, baby.
- [35:02]
Max Chefkin
Yeah. And I think the answer was, well, there's like, two things, one of which is this political correctness point. Like, Thiel really does believe left wing ideas and tolerance and diversity were, like, holding back America. That that was like a significant problem with our country and that all we needed to do was be able to say, you know, stuff. Stuff that's like, maybe borderline racist and get away with it and like, that would make things better because then we wouldn't have to hold back or something. And I think the fact that Trump was doing that and getting up there and saying stuff that was edgy was a big, like, that was a big part of the appeal. And the other thing is these guys want to destroy the old order and, and, and build their new order and build a technological. Yeah, you know, techno future. And Trump, maybe he wasn't super focused on the future, but he was saying we need to break a bunch of stuff.
- [35:57]
Trevor Noah
Yeah.
- [35:57]
Max Chefkin
And I think.
- [35:58]
Guest
Which is very tech. Move fast and break things.
- [36:00]
Trevor Noah
Right.
- [36:01]
Guest
Isn't that like kind of the ethos.
- [36:02]
Max Chefkin
Yeah, that is that, that slogan is, you know, super associated with Facebook. Facebook, Mark Zuck and of course Mark Zuckerberg was basically a mentee of Peter Thiel. Thiel's first big investment was an early bet on Facebook, one of the best venture capital investments of all time. And then I think the last thing is just these guys are opportunists. And Thiel saw it's not that Thiel thought, oh, for sure Trump is gonna win. He thought he might win. And if he does win, and I do kind of like.
- [36:35]
Trevor Noah
It's an investment.
- [36:36]
Max Chefkin
Yeah, exactly. It's an investment.
- [36:37]
Trevor Noah
He made an early investment, high risk.
- [36:40]
Max Chefkin
High reward investment, which is exactly the kind of thing that these tech guys specialize in. But with Musk, I think it was the same thing. I don't think Musk knew for sure that, that, that Trump was going to win, but I think he thought, look, I've already, I've already gone sort of, I've already been red pilled or whatever. I'm already tweeting right wing stuff every day. What am I really going to harm my brand by? By putting a couple hundred million dollars behind Trump? Probably not. If he loses, what have I lost? And if he wins, then I become the, you know, the right hand man of the most powerful person in the world.
- [37:17]
Trevor Noah
And now it's time for today's self care toolkit segment brought to you by Amazon. Whether it's delivering medication to your door with Amazon Pharmacy or 247 virtual care with with Amazon One Medical. Thanks to Amazon, Healthcare just got less painful. You know, one thing I always think about when we talk about self care home remedies, I don't know what it was like in your house, but in mine, if you had a sore throat, you weren't getting medicine right away. Never. You were getting a concoction and a prayer. Most of the time it was warm water, maybe with some salt lemon Honey, ginger. And if you were brave, garlic. Yes, there was always the garlic. How sick are you? Bring out the garlic. Because apparently, I guess sicknesses and vampires have the same weaknesses. At that time, I hated it. I was like, please, just give me something from the pharmacy, please. But now I don't know. I don't know what changed. Now I swear by it. First sign of a cold and I'm suddenly becoming like a backyard herbalist. You know, it's funny how these things stick with you. And what's wild is how different they are. Like, depending on where you grew up, they completely change. My friend from India told me that he used turmeric in warm milk as a remedy when he was growing up, which honestly sounds like a latte now. But back then it was medicine. I've heard of people using onions and socks or steam tents with eucalyptus. People really do get creative. And the thing is, it's not an either or. You can absolutely believe in modern medicine and still make your mom's mystery tea. It's all part of taking care of yourself, knowing what makes you feel better, even if it's just because it reminds you of home. Well, we hope you gave you some ideas for your self care routine. Today's self care toolkit segment was brought to you by Amazon. Thanks to Amazon, healthcare just got less painful. You know, we see this played out in a different way in developing nations, I find so. Because it's a lot more blatant and there. There isn't like a finesse around it. I mean, now it's become blatant in America, I would say. But like, for instance, I grew up in a world where, you know, and you know what I'm talking about. They'd be like, there would be this businessman who's about to go to jail or their business is about to. There'd always be something that's happening. They're losing the mining license or something's happening and they go, okay, I need to go all in on this candidate, otherwise my whole world is gonna come crumbling down. And then they would back them completely. And if the candidate won, they got more mining deals, they got more oil deals, they got more everything. But if they lost, that was it for you. You read about it in like old Cold war Russia as well. It was like, okay, who's supporting Yeltsin or who's going after Gorbachev? It feels like that wasn't America's story. It feels like America was the place where people like, yes, there's, you know, there's shaking hands between Companies and businesses and government, but that's not what this country does. And now it seems like it's very naked, right? Yeah. Now it seems very direct. But this is. Okay, this is what confuses me on, you know, we talk about Peter Thiel and one aspect, Elon Musk makes electric cars. Donald Trump keeps on smashing electric cars and going, like, people don't want these things. They're terrible. Bring oil back, baby. Okay, what am I missing there?
- [40:54]
Guest
Strange bedfellows.
- [40:55]
Trevor Noah
Yeah, but I want, like, am I missing something? Does Elon Musk think The only thing I've thought of is Elon Musk goes, if the electric car industry is destroyed, the legacy brands will die first in it and they'll be the first to bail out because they'll panic. So Ford and all them will be like, okay, we're not making electric cars. And then Tesla will once again be like the only player. And so I think he's betting that he can weather the store more than they can and then he will have a monopoly in the space. And so I think for now he supports Donald Trump trying to like crush the industry. But I don't know what you think, cuz you're in it so deeply.
- [41:32]
Max Chefkin
I think that the story you just told is more or less the right story. Like Tesla has the market lead. So if Tesla has the best margins, if Donald Trump nixed every subsidy for electric vehicles, it'd be very bad for Tesla, but it'd be worse for Tesla's competitors. It's kind of like what you're saying. I do think, like what you were just describing is like an oligarchy, right? Like these business people who are using, who are very powerful, using their business connections to, to influence politics and using that to influence their bottom line. I feel like that is what Elon Musk right now is trying to do. And people have described Musk and Thiel and Bezos as, as oligarchs. And I think there's, there's something to that because the playbooks do feel very similar. I don't think we yet know, like, we don't know how this story ends. And America, like, we may have some oligarchs or some would be oligarchs, but we still live in a democracy and there's still the possibility or even the probability that this won't work, that Musk will not be able to, that yes, he is buying influence when he donates $300 million to Donald Trump. But like, how much influence is he actually buying? Can Donald Trump really just write him A check for like $10 billion. And I think the answer, I think we're gonna learn, and maybe we already are starting to learn that, like, the answer may be no, that Trump is not able because of Congress and because of all of these, you know, because of the countervailing forces, because the fact that many people in the United States, including, you know, Donald Trump voters, do not want to live in that world. And so. So I think. So I just don't think we know yet what the payoff is.
- [43:19]
Trevor Noah
So then maybe I guess for someone like Thiel, it works out because he seems like he's more on the ideological side of it, but Musk seems to be more blow with the wind. But really it's all about the money. Just bottom line, bottom line, bottom line.
- [43:32]
Max Chefkin
I think they're both, they're both about the money, but Thiel is more ideological. It's more of an ideology.
- [43:40]
Guest
And maybe you can explain the psychology of these guys. How much more money do they want? They have so much. Because that doesn't feel like a satisfying explanation when we're talking about the richest man in the world and we're talking about somebody that made a venture capital investment that is unprecedented, will never happen again after the Facebook ipo.
- [44:02]
Max Chefkin
It's a great point. And it's actually what some of them have said in sort of saying like, how could this be corrupt? I don't need more money. Why would I, as a. We've seen David Sachs, who's a, you know, close friend of Thiel and Musk, say this like, why would a rich person be corrupt? They don't need to be corrupt.
- [44:16]
Trevor Noah
Oh, brilliant.
- [44:17]
Guest
I love that.
- [44:18]
Trevor Noah
That's brilliant.
- [44:20]
Guest
It's despicable.
- [44:21]
Max Chefkin
But it's like, wow. So, yeah, maybe. Point taken.
- [44:26]
Guest
Yeah.
- [44:26]
Max Chefkin
On the other hand, like, Elon Musk is worth. I didn't check before I walked in. I'm guessing it's around 300 million. $300 billion? That's not like 300 billion. That's not a giant stack of dollar bills. That's $300 billion largely in illiquid assets. Tesla stock, stock in these private companies, primarily SpaceX. These companies all do business with one another. So if one were to fall very quickly, then all the others might fall. So it's not like he is very rich, but it's not like his wealth is totally stable.
- [45:02]
Guest
Are you saying he's low key broke? Is that what you're trying to say?
- [45:05]
Max Chefkin
He's definitely not. He's definitely not sitting on a ton of cash.
- [45:10]
Trevor Noah
He's not he's not Pablo Escobar.
- [45:11]
Max Chefkin
But I mean, he, he, this is, this is not to say he's broke. He can borrow money. And this is like what he did when he bought Twitter. He, he basically can take some of this, some of these stock certificates, give them to a bank.
- [45:23]
Trevor Noah
It's the biggest scam in the world.
- [45:24]
Max Chefkin
And get money out of it.
- [45:24]
Guest
So he's kind of over leveraged now. If it was not a good investment, he is.
- [45:29]
Max Chefkin
He just is not sitting on a pile of cash. And so if, if some of these stocks were to fall dramatically, he'd still have enough money to have a plane and go after his enemies or whatever, but he would not be mega rich the way he is now. And so I do think they don't feel as secure as we might think we would feel if we were in their shoes.
- [45:54]
Trevor Noah
I'll say one thing to that. I've met a bunch of these men. I haven't met Elon Musk or Donald Trump, but I've met a bunch of, like, mega billionaire people. And I think we should never take for granted how much their drive is governed by just being invited back to the club. You know, it's whoever has the biggest yacht gets the biggest parking spot. You know, you get to dock your boat. There's something that comes with it that goes beyond, like, the money. And sometimes we think of the money because for most people, money is the thing that's governing your life. But once it gets beyond that, the money is just a number that determines where you are positioned now in life. So when you have half a billion dollars, okay, I'm sure there's like a lot of presidents who will take your call when you have $300 billion. They're praying that you take their call. Yeah, Money is now power. It's now having the ability to, what Max was saying, to shape the world. Now think about how many times we, as people go, man, I wish they would. No, no, no. These people don't wish they would.
- [47:07]
Guest
They just do it.
- [47:07]
Trevor Noah
They do. They would. So they phone the Department of Education, you know what I mean, the Secretary of Education, and go, hey, this needs to change in schools. And that person goes, I'll look into it. They go, I don't like that the roads are like this. They go, I'll look into it. You know, And I think that's what we take for granted. But I would love to know this about Elon in particular. And I know it's like a loaded sentence, but I keep feeling it. Like my Spidey Sense. Maybe I spent too much time in Africa. I don't know. It feels like a lot of Elon Musk is a scam. And I know that that is a counterintuitive statement because people will go, what are you talking about, Trevor, man, he's the richest man in the world. He's the company. He's. Every single time he's had a new event, he said, full self driving is not. It's imminent, it's imminent, it's imminent, it's imminent. There is still no full self driving. And now people are like, but have you seen how they drive? That's not what I'm saying. A lot of the stock price is tied to what he says will be done or is achievable. A lot of the valuation is tied to that, but it doesn't get done. And that's where I notice an overlap between, like, him and Donald Trump. Donald Trump. I think it was Jeff Zucker who said this about him, who used to run NBC. Jeff Zucker. Someone asked him once, they said, yo, why do you keep giving Donald Trump the Apprentice? And they're like, this hack failed businessman who's like this goofy dude who's not even a billionaire, who acts like a billionaire. Why do you keep. And Jeff Zucker said, can I tell you something? He said, this man is a one man ratings wrecking ball machine. And he said, because he will go to press events and the press will say, how do you feel about the ratings being down for this season on the Apprentice? And Trump will turn and say, this is the biggest rated show of all time. And the journalist would go, no, it isn't. It's lost ratings. And he's like, no, you're wrong. This is the biggest show. It is watched by more people than ever before. The Apprentice is the biggest show. And Jeff Zucker says he'd never seen a human being who could take reality and just butt up against it and force. And then he would create the reality that he now said existed. And I feel like Musk and Trump do a similar thing. So Musk goes, it will work. It will work, it will work. It doesn't work, doesn't work, doesn't work. And then a version of it does work. And then people are like, aha. And then, thank you, 50 billion. And I know it's like a loaded question. I'm obviously asking it in a blunt way.
- [49:27]
Max Chefkin
Yeah, I mean, is he legit?
- [49:29]
Guest
You're saying, Trevor, you're saying the tech emperor has no clothes.
- [49:32]
Trevor Noah
Yeah, I'm saying, is he legit genuinely.
- [49:34]
Max Chefkin
You use the word like scam. And then what you described was I think what like a tech Silicon Valley people would describe as like a reality distortion field.
- [49:44]
Trevor Noah
And they oh, I love that.
- [49:45]
Max Chefkin
That's the phrase. Right. And it was used memorably around Steve Jobs. People use it to describe Elon Musk. The tendency for these tech guys to you know, kind of like bend reality to their will or to say something and like then the fact of saying it somehow makes it real. Now I'm not saying that the self driving cars obviously are not real and he's been promising that, as you said, for a very long time. And he's.
- [50:09]
Trevor Noah
And I'm not saying they'll never be.
- [50:10]
Guest
Real by the way, but they're not real now.
- [50:11]
Trevor Noah
Yeah. I'm just saying a lot of like the success is based on what people think going to happen when it is gonna happen, but it's not happening. But now the very thing that they got into the position for, they're failing at, but then somehow they spin it to not be failure. Do you know what I mean?
- [50:29]
Max Chefkin
Yeah, I mean I think that maybe that's something, that's an insight that like Trump and Elon have about the world, that it works now or something. The way I've thought about it is more like as a bullshit artist. A bullshit artist isn't necessarily scamming. They're just, oh, okay, I like that. They're just spinning a story or whatever. I love that Elon Musk is, I mean he is an amazing marketer. He's taken a very, it was a very difficult story. Electric vehicles. There were no electric cars really at the time he started doing it. He didn't own any car, he didn't have any cars to sell people. He managed to convince people to give him money.
- [51:07]
Trevor Noah
This is what I mean though. You see what I mean?
- [51:08]
Guest
Yeah, yeah.
- [51:09]
Max Chefkin
I mean like the business model for Tesla was, okay, we're going to make this very expensive car, you're going to give us the money for it, then we will go make it and we will use the extra money left over to make another car. We sell that ahead of time. He sells all his cars ahead of time when there isn't one.
- [51:24]
Trevor Noah
Right.
- [51:24]
Max Chefkin
He's been basically selling products that don't exist for his, you know, his entire career and then hopefully most of the time eventually delivering them. And as long as people, you know, believe that something is, that it's coming, that there is going to be this next thing, it kind of works. And I do feel like we're in this moment where we're going to learn basically, like, how far that goes.
- [51:50]
Trevor Noah
I think in another life, Elon Musk has the ending that Elizabeth Holmes had with the Ranos.
- [51:57]
Guest
Get out of my head. I was thinking, this is what they threw Elizabeth Holmes in jail for.
- [52:01]
Trevor Noah
It's the same thing. Elon gets money to make a car that hasn't been made and basically says the thing is what it isn't and what Cool. Elon is the same guy who then, like, convinces one car manufacturer that he has gotten funding that he doesn't have, and then convinces the bank that the car manufacturer's in when they're not in, and then gets the deal done. But both sides came to the deal because they both had information that wasn't, in fact, true.
- [52:27]
Max Chefkin
Yeah.
- [52:27]
Trevor Noah
And Elizabeth Holmes is in jail. And I'm not saying she shouldn't be in jail, but I'm just like, oh, damn. With a bullshit artist, you just need one person to go to Bernie Madoff. You to go, I need my money, Bernie. And then all of a sudden, the whole thing falls apart. But if no one asks you for the money, Bernie Madoff could still be around as one of the most successful money guys, because no one would ask him for the actual money.
- [52:49]
Max Chefkin
Yeah. There's a fine line between, like, fake it till you make it and faking it, you know, and when you look at him and you look at all the ways he's failed to, like, live up to these promises, there are ways that he has succeeded. And, like, those car, like. And again, if it's. What's so weird and kind of maddening, if you've followed him for a very long time, is he has succeeded beyond his wildest dreams. Like, he. He wanted to have a mainstream electric car. He wanted to make electric cars, have them everywhere. And now. And he has it. And like. Like, if you get an Uber now, like, it's probably going to be a Tesla.
- [53:24]
Trevor Noah
Many of them. It's amazing how many of them are Tesla Model 3.
- [53:26]
Max Chefkin
Right. It's like. It's like a Corolla or something, but it's not enough. Right. Maybe the thing that. That allowed him to get to where he is now, it's like he can't stop it or something, and he just has to keep. Now we're, you know, now we're doing the Cyber Cab or something, and at some point you have to think he's going to, you know, write a check with his mouth that he can't cash. And that is sort of like what every Elon person who's skeptical of him. Every criticism has been waiting for.
- [53:53]
Trevor Noah
I mean, that's where people have lost a lot of money betting against him. A lot of people. That's what makes him a paradox. You know me, I love electric cars. Love, love, love, love, love electric cars. So for me, I've always been the guy who's gone, yes, go, Elon, do the thing. Because I love that concept. I love the idea of Starlink. I think too many parts of the world don't have Internet and this archaic idea of like a cable coming to your house and now you don't have it. And then infrastructure, last mile, it's too. It's too intensive. It's a fantastic idea. Yeah, it has downsides with satellites, I get that. But there's. You know what I mean? It's a fantastic idea. There's so many elements of Elon where I go, great. But I think what. What, you know, rubs me the wrong way is like the Con Manny side of it. I'll tell you, like, the biggest one that got me with Elon was him lying about the video games guys. No, no. Let me tell you something. I've been offended by few things in my life more than I have been, yo. Let me tell you why. I'll tell you why. I play a shit ton of video games, right? And video games have always been, for me at least, the bastion of, like, where you are because nothing else, like, worked for you. We weren't good at video games because we were good at catching a ball. We weren't good at video games because we were the fastest. We weren't good at video games because we were the best looking. We weren't good. No, but that was the place. It's like my mage was at this level because I wasn't at that level in real life. And I don't know how to explain it, but that thing, for me, it was so insignificant that I was like, why does he need to steal that thing as well? I get it when you're doing stock market things, all right? Yeah, I may not like it, but you know what? I'm sure a lot of other people do it in different ways. But when this man came in and stole the valor of video gaming and proclaimed himself one of the top 10 players in the world and talked about how he does it, yo, I remember watching, and then I felt like a hater because I watched it and I said to my friend, I was like, that's impossible. I've always said, like, my whole life there should only be Two modes in a video game. Not easy and hard. It should be unemployed and employed. That should be the mode you play the game in. Because if you are unemployed, you play the game at a different level. When you're employed, you can't get the levels that some of these people get. Right. For me, that was the biggest red flag, and I don't know how to explain it.
- [56:07]
Guest
Not all the kids.
- [56:09]
Trevor Noah
Let me tell you something. I hear that stuff, and I understand why, but Nick Cannon has a lot.
- [56:13]
Guest
Of kids, and he's a red flag.
- [56:14]
Trevor Noah
Yeah, but I'm saying he's not a red flag for the world. For me. For me, Elon Musk lying about the video games and then acting like he didn't lie about the video games when he finally got busted. Now being like. Cause when he sat with Joe Rogan, he proudly professed how. And he used it to. To. To prop up his aptitude. By the way, I think this is what part of the problem I have. He sat across from Joe Rogan, and Joe Rogan was like, you play a lot of video games. You're one of the top in the world. And he's like, yeah, you know, and they've actually shown that. Studies have shown that doctors who use, like. Who play video games actually, they're actually better. They've got more Dext, and they're. They're better at using. And so, yeah, I find it helps me, like, solve problems. And I can see someone going like, wow, he's also one of the best video gamers, which means his brain. Which means his brain. He gets busted. One of the top gamer streamers or whatever talks to him. He goes like, yeah, yeah, of course I get someone in China or whatever to play for me. That's what everyone does.
- [57:04]
Guest
But it shows that it's never enough for him.
- [57:06]
Trevor Noah
But that's what I. But that's what I mean. But I'm saying I can understand somebody who steals my car. I can understand somebody who steals my phone, but then there's like, somebody who's gonna steal the box that my phone came in, even though the two were separate. And I'm like, there's a thief and then there's a kleptomaniac. Do you get what I'm saying?
- [57:30]
Guest
Yeah.
- [57:31]
Trevor Noah
For me, that's the red flag with Elon Musk. If you can lie about that and you've lied about the big things as well, what are the other things that we don't know?
- [57:41]
Max Chefkin
I think you might be onto something. Honestly. We're seeing this, and I Feel like this is something that the media was a little bit slow to pick up on. Musk has been saying there are these protests going on in front of Tesla dealerships and so on. And Musk is saying it's act blue, it's George Soros. We don't totally know what's driving it. And I do think that the video game thing both, like you're saying, is this kind of like naked deception and one that was maybe particularly offensive to his, you know, universe of fans. Yeah. To the young men who like. And I think like, Musk is becoming this symbol partly because of Trump and maybe partly for other reasons having to do with his extreme wealth and so on and the fact that he did this, you know, thing that looked like a Nazi salute to many people. Like he's, he's become a symbol of something very bad for a lot of people. And I do kind of wonder maybe, like, maybe the video game thing was the. Was the turning point of it. You're not the first person who said, like, well, that's going to be the thing that cooks him.
- [58:51]
Trevor Noah
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- [59:49]
Guest
I'm really curious because we have a South African here. We haven't spoken much about his South.
- [59:55]
Trevor Noah
African heritage even there, by the way. Cause Peter Thiel, I'm.
- [60:00]
Guest
Yeah, all of them have a South African connection. Namibia, like all these guys have some southern African connection. And it's particularly apartheid South Africa and white South Africans and Trump's mission to help the very desolate, struggling white South Africans who need to be taken to America because of all the prejudice they're facing in South Africa right now. What do you think about spending his formative years?
- [60:25]
Trevor Noah
That was a joke, by the way. For anyone. Some people be like, Christiana believes it.
- [60:29]
Guest
Yeah, they're having a bad time. That is really bad for them.
- [60:31]
Trevor Noah
It's actually funny. I was. Yeah, I was at a golf club, talking to them about it. And I was like, how are things? And they're like, yeah, it's really tough. Really, really tough. I felt for them, all of those.
- [60:40]
Guest
I only have five houses, all of those guys. But what do you make of. Because his father has kind of become like a. There's all of these characters. You've got Grimes, you've got his eccentric mother, you've got like, the woman that worked with him, that has three children. For him now. Like, it's not just musk for me, because maybe I'm into celebrity gossip. It's all the, like, the parade of characters that come with him. And I think South Africa is the backdrop to a lot of that. What do you make of, like, spending his time there, how it informs his ideology, how it informs. How he's engaging with Trump and some of the policies he wants.
- [61:13]
Max Chefkin
I don't feel like an expert in the politics of, like, the modern day Afrikaner movement. Like, and I don't. I'm not sure that Elon even is, like, I kind of think some of what's going on is he's just like, drinking in the far right, you know, social media stream and, like, there's some far right people talking about, you know, white racism in South Africa. But what you're saying, though, I mean, there has to be some part of the South African ness that is informing this. And I thought about this a lot with Thiel. He was born in Germany, family moved to the United States, and then he spent a couple of years, as I said, first in South Africa and then in modern day Namibia. His father worked at a uranium mine. If you're working at a uranium mine in Namibia, which at the time was like basically a colony, a client state of South Africa, an apartheid state. You are as complicit in the apartheid system as you could possibly be. You are making. You are producing. You're not only, like, dealing with a labor structure that is benefiting from apartheid, but you are trying to produce nuclear weapons so that you can defend that system from the world that is trying to shut you down. And like, all these guys who had family connections in South Africa, and they're.
- [62:27]
Guest
All white, by the way, which is very important.
- [62:30]
Max Chefkin
And they went to American college campuses. And in Thiel's case, it's the 1980s. Apartheid was like the cause on the left. And I think what I think was a political statement by the anti apartheid activists, you know, at Stanford in the 80s. But you process it as a personal attack.
- [62:49]
Guest
Yeah, me and my Family.
- [62:50]
Trevor Noah
My family.
- [62:51]
Max Chefkin
And, like, I did some reporting, talking to people who went to college with him and where he would get into these arguments. He's denied, I should say, supporting apartheid or expressing pro apartheid views, but there are certainly classmates of his who remember him doing so.
- [63:05]
Trevor Noah
Can I just interject and tell you something? And this is something that really plagues me. I have yet to meet someone who supported apartheid. It's really weird, guys.
- [63:18]
Guest
Are you being serious?
- [63:20]
Trevor Noah
I am yet to meet a person. It really worries me because it's almost like apartheid just happened by itself. I mean, no, everything you're saying here. Let me tell you something now. I have yet to meet a person anywhere in the world who was in apartheid, for instance, and who goes like, yeah, no, Trevor, I didn't want those blacks and white. No, I have yet.
- [63:39]
Guest
Every person I'll talk to, Free Mandela.
- [63:42]
Trevor Noah
They go like, I was totally against it. Then I'm like, huh? Everyone was against it. Huh. So who was for it? Cause it seems like there were a lot of people for it seems like a lot of people didn't want the thing to stop.
- [63:52]
Guest
A lot of people benefited from it.
- [63:54]
Trevor Noah
It seems like a lot of, huh. For a thing that nobody wanted to end. But anyway, forgive me. I just.
- [63:59]
Max Chefkin
Anyway. Yeah. What's weird, though, is when I first started talking to Elon, he made apartheid part of the reason he wanted to come to North America. He said, I left South Africa because I was so against apartheid. And he's always very careful.
- [64:16]
Trevor Noah
Wait, how old was he when he left?
- [64:18]
Max Chefkin
He was like, 17 or something.
- [64:20]
Trevor Noah
Okay.
- [64:20]
Max Chefkin
That's the story he told. And of course, you know, the story has shifted a little bit. I mean, you know, now he's very concerned, as, you know, as you're saying, about the, you know, the property rights of the white farmers or whatever.
- [64:32]
Trevor Noah
Yes, yes, yes.
- [64:34]
Max Chefkin
And so I don't know, like, what the truth of it is there, but I do think there might have been a sense of, like, feeling attacked and then reacting, you know, in a sort of extreme way.
- [64:44]
Trevor Noah
So I don't know that this is correct at all. But I've been trying to sit and figure out what it could be. And I think some of it is this. I think a lot of these people, a lot of these tech leaders who came through, like, South Africa and, like, were, you know, in and around apartheid at the time, they witnessed something that is very unique to countries like South Africa, and that is the proximity between business and government and how the two work hand in hand to further each other's goals. Right. So a pause is not a free system. Apartheid is not a world where the best company wins. Apartheid is not a world where the best speech is accelerated. No, apartheid is a system where the government says, will you help us to turn coal into oil? Because we've been oil embargoed. Yes, you have the business. We will give you all the resources you need to give us all the oil we need. And then all the anti apartheid companies, they left South Africa. Right. But the system is set up in such a way where there's like a direct. It's very, very similar to, like, Cold War Russia. You know, it's like, you help the government, the government helps you. You help the government, the government helps you. And then these people come to America where that's, like, frowned upon. It's almost like, oh, no, no, no, no, no. Church and state, things are separate here. You don't do that. But I think they still have this idea where they go, like, no, no, no. Hey, government. We help you and you help us.
- [66:06]
Guest
And they have the racism, too.
- [66:07]
Trevor Noah
Yeah. And I think, for instance, when you talk about ideologies, if you look at Elon's, like, plight against South Africa, again, I'm not sure this is perfect, but I saw it start when he wasn't able to launch Starlink in South Africa. Because in South Africa, the government says they want to make sure that you have minority ownership when you launch a company. And the reason the government did this and they haven't done it perfectly, by the way. I'm never gonna say it's the poster child, but what they were trying to do is they were going, guys, we've learned that money gets closed off. So if we don't make sure that. That companies have representation in terms of who owns the companies, the money's never going to come.
- [66:44]
Guest
When you say minority ownership, South Africa's a black majority. Yes.
- [66:49]
Trevor Noah
No, no. What I mean is like, sorry, now what we say minority here. So I'm saying people of color. Yeah, yeah, people of color.
- [66:55]
Guest
So that explains the anti DEI thing he has. He's just like, oh, the plane crash.
- [66:59]
Trevor Noah
Elon, I think there went, you're not gonna let me open this? And not only did they not let him, they then banned Starlink, and then now Starlink, you can't use it in. Even though it's a satellite thing, they don't enable it in South Africa. And I think Elon now again, was. Personally, he was like, oh, I'm gonna find a way to break this system. And one thing I've heard about Elon, from everyone who's worked in and around his orbit, is he is supremely talented at finding the right lever to pull. And he will pull. Doesn't matter what he's trying to do. But Elon will go, oh, this is. That's the lever I need to get people working harder. That's the lever I need to get these people doing this. That's the lever to start businesses that break things and don't follow the rules. What do you need? You need the people who make the rules to lose some of their power. What's the best way to get those people to lose some of their power? You find the people who are the least happy. You find the people who have the most hate fomenting, and you encourage that, and you grow it and you nestle. And so what you essentially. I love that you said it in the beginning with Peter T. These guys are essentially investing in disruptors all around the world.
- [68:08]
Guest
They're just so. They're very opportunistic.
- [68:10]
Trevor Noah
There's seed funding everywhere. They're using the same principles of, like, money. They go, cristiano, tell me about your movement, huh? You believe that governments shouldn't exist.
- [68:19]
Guest
Give me an idea. Now, you know what?
- [68:20]
Trevor Noah
This sounds like a good company.
- [68:22]
Max Chefkin
Yeah.
- [68:22]
Trevor Noah
They go, this is a great company. You know what? It might be a risky bet, but it's nothing in the greater scheme of things. I'm just gonna throw you a bone. And I'm gonna throw you a bone. And I'm gonna throw you a bone. And as we see it growing around the world, you just need a few unicorns for all your bets to pay off. You need a few billion dollar companies to make up for every, like, $100,000 you've invested. And I think that's what he's doing there. I think that's what he's doing in Germany. Because, again, Germany, people forget this. People are like, why is Elon involved? Which place makes some of the, like, most expensive and most important cars in the world? Germany. If Germany collapses and if the German car economy collapses, seems like there's a big winner somewhere.
- [69:01]
Guest
Yeah.
- [69:02]
Trevor Noah
His name is Elon Musk. Places that he doesn't care about, it's because they don't in some way shape or form benefit him. Do you know what I mean?
- [69:08]
Max Chefkin
Yeah, I think you're right. I think there's always an angle with him, and, like, often a business angle. Like, I don't think he's ever. I mean, he is. He does obviously have some ideology, but like you said about the Apartheid system and this idea of like becoming sort of a client of the government or something like that. Like, he has been so freaking good at getting the government to give him money. Yeah, brilliant finding. Like you said, finding these levers and those levers can be like reaching regular people and saying like, here is this awesome product. But they also are often, and have often been like political levers. And like, I agree, I don't fully understand the dynamics of German politics and what exactly he's doing with the AfD, which is the far right party in Germany. But it definitely, everything I know about Elon tells me there's an angle there. And whether it's something having to do the auto industry, you know, he has union issues in Germany or perhaps, you know, Europeans have a space agency, they compete with SpaceX, maybe looking for more contracts there or whatever. But he's, he's trying to find an inn and it's just there, you know, there's, obviously there's collateral damage. Sometimes when that's your modus operandi, I.
- [70:31]
Trevor Noah
Know we're gonna have to let you go. So it's a terrible question to ask you because we are finding you in the middle of a story. This is a book that hasn't concluded, but if you were to try and not necessarily predict what you think will happen, but maybe a more interesting one for me would be what do you predict Their end goal and their aim is because, you know, sort of to what Cristiano was saying, they have the money or they have the access to the money, they have the valuation, they have, you know, the power, et cetera. But what is, is there an end goal? Like, does Peter Thiel rest when something is achieved? Does Elon Musk rest when something is achieved? Or are they, as you said, like a, like a fusion reaction that is now powering itself infinitely?
- [71:16]
Max Chefkin
I think with Thiel, there is a more calculating approach. He has not gone all in with Trump and there were a lot of people around him and in the kind of right wing Silicon Valley world saying, like, oh, what a huge mistake. I mean, he was the earliest Trump supporter. Like, why is he not supporting Trump? But I think like we are living, as you said, in that moment and there has been, you know, as we're talking, like this kind of high of Trump support and Trump's power, and that won't last. And I think Thiel has set himself well, set himself up well in case it doesn't last because he has a very close relationship with J.D. vance, who's Trump's, you know, Trump's vice president and who Thiel basically helped him start his political career, was his main donor to Vance's Senate campaign. So if Vance, you know, becomes the Republican candidate in 2028, as I think he's probably the favorite to do, Thiel has an in Musk, I think, is somebody who needs this kind of endless crisis, a sort of endless series of, I don't know, like, games or something. What he wants, his endgame is he sells all the cars, he sells all the rocket launches. He's worth way more money. He's even said this, you know, he thinks Tesla, his car company, should be worth, you know, $30 trillion or something. If it's worth $30 trillion, Elon is going to be worth, you know, like, I don't know, like, six trillion more, probably. So for him, it's, it's just like way more dominance, being able to sort of a God, essentially run the world.
- [72:56]
Trevor Noah
Yeah, God King. That's what it sounds like to me.
- [72:57]
Max Chefkin
I don't think that is the most likely scenario, but, but I do think that is the, that's like, what he is pushing for. And I think to some extent it's up to voters and democracy to try to restrain him.
- [73:15]
Trevor Noah
Damn. Well, here's hoping, Max. Here's hoping. And I say this, I hope you take this in the best way possible. I hope that your podcast becomes less relevant as time goes.
- [73:28]
Max Chefkin
Fair enough.
- [73:28]
Trevor Noah
And I hope the people who listen now are now just, like, interested in business and like, you know, and I, I, I hope it has, like, not as much of a broad appeal because right now I think Elon Inc. It is like the hub of everything. And so, yeah, man, thank you for taking the time and coming and sharing a bit of the universe with us. Appreciate it.
- [73:45]
Max Chefkin
Thank you both for having me.
- [73:52]
Trevor Noah
What now with Trevor Noah is produced by Spotify Studios in partnership with Day Zero Productions. The show is executive produced by Trevor Noah, Sanaz Yamin and Jodi Avigan. Our senior producer is Jess Hackel. Claire Slaughter is our producer. Music, mixing and mastering by Hannis Brown. Thank you so much for listening. Join me next Thursday for another episode of what Now.