Elon Musk’s Fight With Trump Threatens $48 Billion in Government Contracts

The information present the US can also be on the hook for about $14 billion for SpaceX’s Starlink web service at quite a few workplaces, comparable to a Division of Inside facility in Nevada.

The information might be outdated or embrace errors, however lots of the listed figures line up with press releases from companies such because the US House Power. A few of the funding is topic to congressional approval, and a portion might find yourself going to SpaceX’s rivals.

However SpaceX’s competitors have confronted quite a few technical setbacks, and Musk’s firm stays the dominant market chief. The billionaire said this week that SpaceX would earn about $15.5 billion in income this yr, practically double estimates from two years in the past. SpaceX has accounted for 134 of the 166 orbital launches within the US thus far this yr, in response to tracking by Jonathan McDowell, an astrophysicist on the Harvard-Smithsonian Heart for Astrophysics.

WIRED did not evaluation detailed contracts or seek for offers the federal government could have struck with Musk’s corporations by means of intermediaries. As an illustration, some authorities companies could also be shopping for advertisements on Musk’s X social media platform by means of promoting companies.

The federal government’s automobile fleet includes Tesla electric vehicles, in response to paperwork on-line, and the Basic Companies Administration just lately paid the corporate for upkeep.

However the GSA’s annual Federal Fleet Report doesn’t break down the variety of automobiles by producer or supply particulars on future spending. The report lists 7,706 battery-electric automobiles within the authorities fleet. Earlier this yr, the Trump administration paused orders for brand spanking new zero-emission automobiles, dealing a blow to corporations comparable to Tesla.

DOGE Pinching

Musk’s corporations have benefited from authorities assist for years. In February, an evaluation by The Washington Submit found Musk companies had obtained not less than $38 billion since 2003 in authorities contracts, loans, subsidies and tax credit throughout the US, together with on the state and native ranges. A New York Occasions evaluation from October identified not less than $15.4 billion in federal authorities contracts over the previous decade for Tesla and SpaceX.

However Musk himself has tried to take a sequence noticed to federal spending by means of his work main the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency, which claims to have saved $180 billion since January, together with by canceling contracts, although that determine stays extremely disputed.

A few of DOGE’s efforts had been briefly blocked by the federal courts and likewise drew protests from federal labor unions, public activists, Congress, states, and even Trump’s own aides and cupboard secretaries. Final month, Musk stated he was stepping away from DOGE work to deal with his corporations.

Trump’s cost-cutting initiatives haven’t stopped, although. Hiring freezes stay in impact, and the significance of stretching every greenback additional is being emphasised greater than ever at many federal companies, in response to representatives at two corporations with main authorities contracts. They declined to be named out of concern of retribution from Trump.

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