Mark Cuban and Elon Musk have often sparred on X, Musk’s social media platform. But Cuban says he does get the Tesla and SpaceX chief’s sense of humor.
Cuban said that Musk’s joke was “kind of insane” but defended Musk by arguing that that’s just the kind of banter you’d expect from him.
Cuban told Cohen that he sent Musk a text once — adding that they’re “not friends” but have communicated in the past.
“We just texted back and forth a few times and he had just had a child, and I said: ‘Congrats on your 90th child,'” Cuban said.
“And his response was — ‘Mars needs people.’ Right, so that’s just Elon’s sense of humor, right? I have no problem throwing Elon under the bus, but I’ll save it for when it’s truly deserved,” he added.
Musk, for his part, likes to believe he’s often engaging in harmless trolling on his social media platform, once proclaiming himself the Chief Troll Officer.
But his online antics have put him under intense scrutiny on several occasions.
In 2018, Musk tweeted that he was considering taking Tesla private at $420, referring to the pseudo-holiday of smoking marijuana on April 20. The Securities and Exchange Commission opened up an investigation that ended in a $40 million settlement Musk and Tesla had to pay out. Musk and Tesla admitted no wrongdoing but the CEO agreed to relinquish his chair role.
On Sunday, after the apparent assassination attempt against former President Donald Trump, Musk shared a post musing why the same thing hasn’t happened to Trump’s political opponents.
The comment sparked a probe from the Secret Service, according to Bloomberg, which filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the agency for any documents referencing Musk’s post.
The agency told Bloomberg that the records were exempt from the FOIA request because it could “interfere with enforcement proceedings.”
“The Secret Service is aware of the social media post made by Elon Musk and as a matter of practice, we do not comment on matters involving protective intelligence,” a Secret Service spokesperson wrote in an email to Business Insider. “We can say, however, that the Secret Service investigates all threats related to our protectees.”
Musk deleted his post on the same day. Like many of his controversial posts, the billionaire called this one a joke.
“Well, one lesson I’ve learned is that just because I say something to a group and they laugh doesn’t mean it’s going to be all that hilarious as a post on X,” he wrote.
Musk and Cuban did not respond to a request for comment.