I think there was a lot of pressure on Tesla/Elon to donate and participate more, and higher ups turned pretty hard on him when he didn't. They were pulling the tax credit from Tesla while holding EV summits with everyone but him. I don't think he was being reactionary, I think his hand was forced.
Further he really isn't a conservative. He's still running around on X talking about how we need to double the number of H1-B's and other social-left causes. Cutting spending through DOGE is something every Republican has talked about for decades, and I don't think it's a major flip for him to want to do that.
I don't think H1-Bs are really a "social-left cause". They're something that big tech companies like because they get to cherry-pick skilled workers and keep them locked in. On the main political spectrum, I think they're pretty centrist. The right dislikes them because they're immigration in disguise, the left dislikes them because they're indentured servitude in disguise.
He's incredibly conservative. He very much likes the idea of Neo-feudalism. You have a class that owns everything (of which he's the prime example right now) and then you have a class that labors to rent things from people like him. Those who don't - or can't - play that game are simply not fit to survive.
It's a school of thought so old that we barely recognize it anymore, but that's what he wants to return to. Lots of tech bros are into it.
Further he really isn't a conservative. He's still running around on X talking about how we need to double the number of H1-B's and other social-left causes. Cutting spending through DOGE is something every Republican has talked about for decades, and I don't think it's a major flip for him to want to do that.