One of the tasks that Elon Musk has ahead is to review the expenses of the Pentagon. This Tuesday, in his unusual appearance in the Oval Office of the White House with his son X Æ A-XII with Donald Trump, he was asked if he did not mean that a conflict of interest, given the billionaires contracts that Spacex has with the department of Defense. “The first thing, I am not the one who presents the contract, you know, they are Spacex people, or something, those who present the contract,” the billionaire, founder, chief maximum and main shareholder of Spacex was dispatched. Musk raffles conflicts of interest and transparency with their special employee status of the Republican Administration while begun to benefit from the measures promoted by himself, such as the media cuts to regulators and supervisors, all with the approval of the president , Donald Trump.
Elon Musk’s case is not precedents. The richest man in the world, with an empire of companies with conflicts and contracts with federal agencies, has assumed enormous power to carry out a “drastic reform” of the administration in which Trump has given him broad powers. Root, that places him in a position to favor his priorities. Is it a waste to allocate dozens of millions of dollars to save millions of lives in Africa, but it is not to allocate billions to space programs with which to see closer its reverie to create a human civilization on Mars?
Musk is the owner of scissors and has decided, for example, to dismantle the Office for Financial Consumer Protection (CFPB), which considers a useless body. That agency is dedicated to fighting the abuses of large companies against citizens and before him dozens of claims against Tesla, the electric car manufacturer of which he is also chief and main shareholder, in relation to the financing of his vehicles. “CFPB rip,” Musk tweeted. The dog dead, the rage is over. Tesla will not have to worry much about those complaints. In addition, the CFPB depends on the strict supervision of the companies that want to enter the payment media business, as X wants to make its social network. Clear path.
The owner of Tesla did not hide in campaign that with his deregulating offensive he aspired to benefit his companies. For example, he told analysts that he aspired to favor himself creating a simpler way for the federal approval of autonomous vehicles instead of complicated state regulations that exist now. Similarly, you can provide a more favorable regulatory framework for the launch of rockets (Spacex), artificial intelligence (XAI) and computer implants for the brain (Neuralink).
Under research
In several of its companies, Musk has been subject to the scrutiny of supervisors. For example, its autonomous driving system is under the magnifying glass of the Defect Research Office of the National Road Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSSA), which has identified four cases in which a vehicle Tesla suffered an accident after entering a reduced visibility zone of the road. In parallel, the Department of Justice and the Securities and Bag (SEC) commission investigate whether Musk and Tesla have exaggerated the autonomous driving capabilities of their cars. The Department of Justice also investigates whether Tesla cheated customers about the distance that their electric vehicles can travel before needing a recharge.
Spacex launches have also been investigated by the Federal Aviation Authority (FAA). Already in campaign, Musk said it was necessary to end so much regulation: “Unless there is a conscious effort for deregulation and have a sensible regulation, Mars will be impossible. We will be confined on Earth, ”he said at a rally in Pennsylvania.
In Joe Biden’s last week in power, FAA temporarily stopped the starship space x Caribbean. The FAA chief resigned after Trump’s arrival to power.
Related appointments
The president has been appointed Musk allies for prominent positions of the Administration, including the amateur astronaut Jared Isaacman for NASA director, the main client of his company Spacex. David Sacks, “Tsar of cryptocurrencies and artificial intelligence”, in favor of a lax regulation, is another old man of the tycoon. Both are part of the “PayPal mafia”, as they were co -founders of said payment company.
In addition, the Securities and Stock Exchange Commission (SEC) also demanded just before Trump’s arrival to be able to skip the law and deceive investors in the purchase of Twitter, with an estimated illicit benefit of more than 150 million dollars , an open investigation in 2022. Musk was challenging about it and the then president of the SEC, Gary Gensler, already resigned, will replace Paul Atkins, chosen by Trump for the position. The signature of the multimillionaire Neuralink is also under investigation of the SEC, as recognized by its lawyer.
Musk companies also accumulate complaints of alleged discriminatory and abusive practices before the Labor Department. Young engineers who are part of the Government Efficiency Department team (Doge) have had access to their systems. The unions complained that there is confidential information about research on Musk companies and commercial secrets of the competition. Trump has fired several members of the National Labor Relations Council, paralyzing their ability to impose sanctions.
Many of these investigations can end at all with Trump in power and Musk as their main ally. Meanwhile, the billionaire continues to make all kinds of decisions on issues that directly or indirectly affect him. When on Tuesday they asked him at the White House about conflicts of interest, he replied: “All our actions are totally public, so if you see something like: ‘Elon, there may be a conflict there’, it is not that people go to be shy about it. They will say it immediately. ” Actually, a good part of Doge’s performances are opaque, although both Musk and the organism themselves are tweeted without much context some of their cuts, sometimes spreading misinformation or falsehoods.
Trump himself also asked about it, with Musk in front: “He is a guy successfully, so we want him to do this. We do not want a guy to do it without success, ”he argued first, to ensure that if he saw any conflict or a problem, he would not let him get into. Actually, as with the CFPB, the president seems to look the other way.
