It’s been a wild few days for tech billionaire Elon Musk. On Wednesday, the Justice Division warned him that his $1 million giveaway to swing state voters could be unlawful. After which on Thursday The Wall Street Journal broke the information that Musk has been having non-public conversations with Russian President Vladimir Putin for years.
Based on the Journal, Musk has been chatting with Putin since 2022. The Journal based mostly its reporting on conversations with officers within the U.S., Europe, and Russia. It’s been an open secret in highly effective political circles for years.
What do the world’s richest man and a brutal authoritarian have to debate? Fairly a bit because it seems. They’ve chatted about enterprise, private points, and the state of the world. Musk is a vital authorities contractor with a safety clearance and fingers in quite a lot of totally different firms.
SpaceX alone has billions in authorities contracts and a few of them are so delicate that the very nature of them is classed, together with one issued in 2021 for $1.8 billion. Musk’s Starlink has proved an unbelievable battleground instrument. The satellite tv for pc web service has been instrumental in preserving strains of communication open within the battle in Ukraine.
Musk has donated greater than a thousand Starlink terminals to Kyiv and the Pentagon has footed the invoice for tons of extra. However they don’t all the time work like they need to. Final yr, Ukrainian drone operators complained that the sign to drones above the Black Sea reduce out as they approached Russian-occupied Crimea.
Starlink has repeatedly stated that its terminals aren’t meant to be weapons of battle and needs to be reserved for civilian use. However the terminals preserve popping up in Russia as properly, arriving there from different nations. And Moscow has been utilizing them for battle. When Starlink catches the rogue terminals, it cuts them off.
Based on the Journal, Musk and Putin have chatted about Starlink throughout their varied non-public conversations. Putin requested Musk to not activate Starlink terminals in Taiwan. He wished the billionaire to do it as a private favor to Chinese language President Xi Jinping.
Once more, Musk has a safety clearance. He’s an essential navy contractor who the Pentagon depends on to effectively conduct the enterprise of battle. He’s additionally a reckless idiot who has concerned himself with a international dictator and injected himself into home politics. The person is a national security risk, full cease.
And although the Pentagon has investigated him and reprimanded him over his public and rumored drug use, it has but to tug his safety clearance. When Semafor requested NASA Administrator Invoice Nelson in regards to the story on Friday, Nelson stated he’d largely handled folks apart from Musk and that SpaceX had been “phenomenally profitable.” “I don’t know if that story is true. I believe it needs to be investigated.” Nelson added. “If it’s true there have been a number of conversations with Elon Musk and the president of Russia, then that might be regarding, significantly for NASA and the Division of Protection, for a few of the intelligence businesses.
Requested in regards to the WSJ report on Elon Musk’s conversations with Putin, @SenBillNelson tells @burgessev:
“[SpaceX] have been phenomenally profitable … I do not know that that story is true. I believe it needs to be investigated. If the story is true … that might be regarding.” pic.twitter.com/5Mlo2AEDNx
— Semafor (@semafor) October 25, 2024
None of it might matter if Donald Trump turns into the subsequent president of america. And Musk is doing his damndest to make that occur.
The billionaire has been spending cash on the Trump marketing campaign prefer it’s going out of fashion. He’s by no means been politically impartial, however he’s additionally by no means been this personally concerned in a candidate. Via his America PAC and different choices, Musk has shoveled an estimated $118.5 million into the marketing campaign for the reason that summer season.
Musk can be providing $47 to registered swing state voters prepared to signal a petition saying they’re in help of free speech and the Second Modification. Signing the petition additionally enters folks right into a lottery with the possibility to win $1 million. Musk has promised he’ll give away an enormous money prize to 1 petition signer every single day till the election as he makes an attempt to make himself into the Mr Beast of politics.
If that sounds bizarre and unlawful, you’re not the one one who thinks that. Solely petition signers within the states of Pennsylvania, Georgia, Nevada, Arizona, Michigan, Wisconsin, and North Carolina are eligible for the payday. And although the petition and its guidelines aren’t specific about who these voters ought to forged a poll for, it’s arduous to think about anybody signing doesn’t know who Musk would like.
After Musk introduced the sweepstakes, the Justice Division sent a letter of warning to his America PAC. Justice informed the PAC that the lottery could violate federal election regulation. However Musk continues to be freely giving prizes. Final night time, simply earlier than 11 p.m. Japanese Normal Time, the America PAC printed an image of Jason Holland of Michigan holding a big novelty test. Holland grinned in his photograph above a hyperlink directing folks to signal the petition.