Elon Musk Meets With Speaker Kevin McCarthy on Capitol Hill

Steven T. Dennis and Laura Litvan, Bloomberg News

US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, a Republican from California, speaks during a news conference at the US Capitol in Washington, DC, US, on Thursday, Jan. 12, 2023. House Republicans voted Tuesday to set up a special panel to scrutinize investigations by the Justice Department and other Biden administration agencies, which could allow them to slow current probes involving former President Donald Trump. , Bloomberg

(Bloomberg) -- Elon Musk made a surprise visit to Capitol Hill on Thursday and met with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy.

“He came to wish me a happy birthday,” said McCarthy, who turned 58 on Thursday. “We’ve been friends for years.”

Asked if he had discussed the debt ceiling with the billionaire Twitter Inc. and Tesla Inc. chief executive officer, McCarthy responded “no.” He ignored other questions as he entered the House chamber to vote.

Musk wasn’t immediately seen leaving McCarthy’s office suite on the second floor of the Capitol.

On Twitter afterward, he said he had met with both the speaker and House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries “to discuss ensuring that this platform is fair to both parties.” It was not clear where the encounter with Jeffries took place.

Jeffries’ office declined to comment on Musk’s tweet.

Musk is a longtime McCarthy donor and urged voters last year to vote Republican. He attended a conference with McCarthy last year and recently tweeted his support for him to become speaker.

McCarthy has joked about not being able to afford test driving a Tesla. Most of the Tesla drivers in Congress, however, are Democrats.

Read more: Tesla Drivers in Congress Like Their Cars, Split on Elon Musk

Musk, who in 2020 announced that he had moved to Texas from California, has become more involved in politics over the past few years, and been critical President Joe Biden and Democrats, claiming last year that the president was beholden to organized labor and that the party was damaging his businesses.

Musk has also praised Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, a possible Republican presidential candidate in 2024, and predicted that he could defeat Biden, who rarely mentions Musk or Tesla when he discusses electric vehicles and the automobile industry.

(Updates with Jeffries’ office declining to comment, in sixth paragraph.)