Sen. Graham Warns Elon Musk After He Calls for De-escalation of Ukraine War

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) targeted Elon Musk implicit caller Twitter posts and warned that senators could instrumentality distant Tesla’s taxation breaks aft Musk urged for de-escalation of the Russia–Ukraine war.

“I inactive precise overmuch enactment Ukraine, but americium convinced that monolithic escalation of the warfare volition origin large harm to Ukraine and perchance the world,” Musk wrote connected Twitter this week successful effect to a Musk-critical poll made by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Musk besides posted a canvass of his ain connected whether radical successful the disputed Donbass and Crimea regions should determine whether they’re portion of Ukraine oregon Russia.

That prompted a captious remark and informing from Graham.

“With each owed respect to Elon Musk—and I bash respect him—I would suggest helium needs to recognize the facts of the Russian penetration of Ukraine,” Graham wrote connected Twitter. “Suggesting we extremity the Russian penetration by simply giving Russia parts of Ukraine—after each the suffering—is dumb. It is besides an affront to the bravery of the Ukrainians warring to support their homeland.”

Later successful the thread, Graham suggested that lawmakers “should revisit the electrical conveyance taxation recognition boondoggle.”

“It is wherever the recognition is present solely benefiting electrical conveyance manufacturers who person accrued prices adjacent to the taxation credit,” helium wrote connected Twitter, successful what immoderate suggested is simply a veiled menace against Musk’s company, Tesla, the largest shaper of electrical vehicles successful the United States.

Starlink

In response, Musk said his steadfast has not received a user taxation recognition successful respective years.

An aged pistillate walks past a gathering partially destroyed by a rocket onslaught successful the halfway of Kharkiv, Ukraine, connected Sept. 13, 2022. (Sergy Bobok/AFP via Getty Images)

“First of all,” helium wrote, “Tesla hasn’t had that user taxation recognition for years [and] we didn’t inquire for this one–GM [and] Ford did.”

Other than Graham’s criticism, the Ukrainian ambassador to Germany, told Musk to “[expletive] off.”

“The lone result is that present nary Ukrainian volition EVER bargain your [expletive] tesla crap,” Ukraine’s ambassador to Germany, Andrij Melnyk, said connected Twitter. “So bully luck to you.”

During the aboriginal portion of the Ukraine–Russia conflict, Musk announced that helium would usage his Starlink Internet work to assistance Ukraine’s authorities arsenic good arsenic its subject efforts against Russia. This week, Musk confirmed that SpaceX spent $80 cardinal connected Starlink successful the Eastern European country.

“SpaceX’s retired of pouch outgo to alteration & enactment Starlink successful Ukraine is ~$80M truthful far. Our enactment for Russia is $0. Obviously, we are pro Ukraine,” helium said.

War Developments

Russia’s penetration of Ukraine has begun to unravel aft a Ukrainian counteroffensive successful which thousands of quadrate miles of territory person been retaken since the commencement of September, including dozens of settlements successful caller days.

In a stroke for Moscow, thousands of Russian troops person retreated aft the beforehand enactment crumbled, archetypal successful the northeast, and, since the opening of this week, besides successful the south.

Members of Russia’s Federation Council, the precocious location of parliament, be a league to ratify authorities connected annexing Ukraine’s Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk, and Zaporizhzhia regions into Russia, successful Moscow connected Oct. 4, 2022. (Russian Federation Council/Handout via Reuters)

Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a instrumentality to incorporated 4 partially occupied Ukrainian regions into Russia, including Zaporizhzhia, successful Europe’s biggest attempted annexation since World War II.

Zelenskyy said connected Wednesday that his service had retaken much settlements successful the confederate Kherson portion and footage released from Kherson showed a Russian infantry warring conveyance with a achromatic portion of cloth wrapped astir its weapon tube successful evident surrender.

Reuters contributed to this report.