US President Donald Trump has hit out at former close ally Elon Musk over the multi-billionaire’s launch of a new political party.
Musk, the single biggest Republican donor in the 2024 elections, says he wants to create a new political party to lower the US national debt, which currently stands at $37tn.
The America Party was announced by Musk on July 5.
After spending more than $290mn in 2024 to help elect Trump and secure a Republican majority in Congress, Musk very publicly broke with Trump and his party over their “One Big Beautiful Bill,” which the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget warns could boost the debt by as much as $5tn over a decade.
After his departure in May from the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, which aimed to cut government spending, Musk became increasingly vocal in his criticisms of Trump and Republicans for not slashing more.
Musk already has a super political action committee: In 2024, Musk gave his America PAC about $250mn to run get-out-the-vote operations for Trump and 17 House Republicans.
But creating a political party is a much more complex process than starting a super PAC.
To be recognised by the Federal Election Commission as a “national committee” — a necessary step to be competitive in federal elections — requires an onerous application process, without which a party cannot receive significant donations or co-ordinate campaign resources.
To earn the FEC recognition, Musk would need to create party organisations in multiple states — which have their own, varied laws governing whether a party can appear on ballots — plus a national committee responsible for its day-to-day operations.
The party would have to demonstrate it has its own governing rules and platform and a physical office for the national branch.
At the presidential level, third-party candidates are often accused of being spoilers.
Ralph Nader’s 2000 presidential campaign for the Green Party received 97,488 votes in Florida, significantly exceeding the 537-vote margin by which Republican George W Bush defeated Democrat Al Gore.
Another Green Party presidential candidate, Jill Stein, was widely perceived to have siphoned enough votes from Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election to have cost the Democrat the election.
Those claims aren’t always substantiated by academic analyses.
Winning a federal election is a very expensive venture, too.
Startup political parties have historically had trouble raising money, and public matching funds — taxpayer-provided support for campaign financing — are available only to presidential candidates. Eligibility for these funds is determined in part by parties’ vote totals from the previous election.
The Republican and Democratic parties also work to limit competition.
However, the majority of Americans like the idea of a third party that can compete with the major two. In October 2024, 58% of voters told Gallup that one was needed in the US.
Three-quarters of those who responded to an April poll by the conservative-leaning Hoover Institution said that the national debt is a concern.
However, it’s not clear whether the issue is important enough to voters to serve as the organising principle of a competitive political party. If Musk issues a more comprehensive platform, it may be easier to predict the popularity of the America Party.
Make no mistake, it takes more than a declaration on social media, even by the world’s richest man, to create a political party in the US.
But the number of registered independents and third-party members is also growing as voters break from the two-party system at increasing rates, according to an NBC News analysis.
That said, even if Musk isn’t able to meme a new party into an immediate electoral force, it could still have political significance.
America Party may not significantly impact two-party dominance, but could disrupt the system by highlighting key issues and pressuring the main two parties to act.