Mnuchin Mixes Up Flags in Twitter Clash With Axl Rose

Rock singer is not a fan of the Treasury secretary
By Rob Quinn,  Newser Staff
Posted May 7, 2020 6:32 AM CDT
Axl Rose Clashes With Mnuchin on Twitter
Guns N' Roses' Axl Rose performs on the first weekend of the Austin City Limits Music Festival at Zilker Park on Friday, Oct. 4, 2019, in Austin, Texas.   (Photo by Jack Plunkett/Invision/AP)

Guns N' Roses frontman Axl Rose tangled with Treasury Department frontman Steven Mnuchin in a Twitter spat Wednesday night. "It’s official! Whatever anyone may have previously thought of Steve Mnuchin he’s officially an a--hole," Rose tweeted. Mnuchin soon responded, tweeting: "What have you done for the country lately?" He added an emoji of Liberia's red-and-white-striped flag. Minutes later, the Treasury secretary removed the tweet and replaced it with one featuring the American flag, Business Insider reports. Rose joked that he didn't know the US was trying to "emulate Liberia's economic model," and told Mnuchin: "unlike u I don’t hold a fed gov position of responsibility 2 the American people n’ go on TV tellin them 2 travel the US during a pandemic."

That last statement could be in reference to a Fox Business Network interview Mnuchin gave Monday, in which he said only time will tell if international travel will be feasible later in 2020 but encouraged domestic travel. "This is a great time for people to explore America," he said, per the Washington Post. Some Twitter users had a field day with the unexpected clash, with one tweeting: "As crazy as 2020 has been, absolutely no one had Mnuchin and Axl Rose fight on twitter on their Bingo card," Page Six reports. Seth Cohen at Forbes is surprised that Mnuchin, "tasked with the responsibility to help navigate our country’s finances at a time of national crisis," found the time to clash with a rock star. In 2018, Rose said the band asked President Trump to stop using their music at events. Their 1991 hit "Live and Let Die," however, was played when Trump visited a mask factory this week. (More Axl Rose stories.)

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