Even before Donald Trump was re-elected, his most famous supporter, Elon Musk, came up with a request for his presidential transition. He wanted Trump to identify some employees of Musk’s rocket company, SpaceX, as top government officials — including the Defense Department, according to two people briefed on the calls.
That request, which would move SpaceX employees to an agency that is its biggest client, is a sign of the benefits Musk can reap after investing more than $100 million in Trump’s campaign, which has spurred a near-constant flow of Trump supporters. Content on his social media platforms, X, and making a public appearance in the hard-fought state of Pennsylvania on behalf of the candidate.
The outreach to SpaceX employees, which has not been reported, shows the extent to which Musk wants to fill a potential Trump administration with his closest confidantes as his multibillion-dollar government contracts pose a conflict over any government role. Musk and SpaceX and Tesla, his electric vehicle company, did not respond to requests for comment. A spokeswoman for Trump’s transition team also did not respond to a request for comment.
The six companies that Musk oversees are deeply entangled with federal agencies. They contract billions to launch rockets, build satellites and provide space-based communications services. Tesla earns hundreds of millions more from emissions-trading credits created by federal law. And Musk’s companies are facing at least 20 recent probes, including one aimed at self-driving car technology that Tesla considers critical to its future.
Now, Musk will have the ear of the president, who oversees all those agencies. Musk could also gain the power to oversee them himself if Trump follows through on his promise to appoint him as head of the Government Efficiency Commission. Trump has told Musk that he wants to bring the same scalpel to government that he brought to Twitter when he bought the company.
The influence could be eliminated or weakened, one of the biggest checks on Musk’s power: the federal government. “All the pesky enforcement stuff goes away,” said Stephen Myro, managing partner of Beacon Policy Advisors, a firm in Washington that sells corporations daily updates on regulatory and legislative trends. NYT