SpaceX CEO Elon Musk may be a U.S. citizen, but we’ve known for a while that he was at least sympathetic to Russian dictator Vladimir Putin after he refused to allow Ukraine to use Starlink to attack Russian ships in the Black Sea with drones. Then, as if there was any doubt, he went all-in on Trump. As it turns out, Musk’s Russia connection actually runs much deeper, as the SpaceX CEO “has been in regular contact with Russian President Vladimir Putin since late 2022,” the Wall Street Journal reports.
This information was reportedly confirmed not only by multiple current and former U.S. and European intelligence officials but also by Russians, as well. While they did discuss “personal topics,” Musk and Putin also allegedly talked “business and geopolitical tensions.” Two sources have reportedly confirmed that Putin once asked Musk not to activate Starlink in Taiwan “as a favor to Chinese leader Xi Jinping.”
The Wall Street Journal doesn’t have a record of every topic Musk and Putin have discussed, but the fact that Musk would willingly speak with Putin is bad enough. Their discussion of Musk involving himself in international affairs is even more egregious and suggests they likely talked about far more than just keeping Starlink out of Taiwan. Still, the true extent of their relationship is likely still only known by a few intelligence officials, as multiple White House officials told the WSJ they were unaware of Musk’s regular contact with the Kremlin and the newspaper referring to it as “a closely held secret.”
As you can imagine, the fact that a Department of Defense contractor with a security clearance is in regular communication with an enemy dictator raises more than a few national security concerns. Whether or not this amounts to treason is something for lawyers and the courts to decide, but make no mistake, this is serious. Unfortunately for us, NASA’s dependence on SpaceX means many officials reportedly feel their hands are tied. “They don’t love it,” one source said before confirming the administration has yet to trace back any specific security leaks to Musk.
While Musk’s communications with Putin and other Russian officials appear to have kicked off after Russia invaded Ukraine, he’s long been interested in Russia and its space program. Putin also isn’t the only right-wing politician that Musk has spoken with even if that relationship is by far the most damning:
Musk has long had a fascination with Russia and its space and rocket programs. Walter Isaacson’s biography of Musk said the businessman traveled to Moscow in 2002 to negotiate the purchase of rockets for his fledgling space program, but passed out during a vodka-heavy lunch. The sale ultimately failed, though his Russian hosts gave Musk a bottle of vodka with his likeness superimposed on a drawing of Mars.
The billionaire’s conversations with Putin and Kremlin officials highlight his increasing inclination to stretch beyond business and into geopolitics. He has met several times and talked business with Javier Milei of Argentina, as well as former Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, whom he defended in an acrimonious online debate.
Putin is on a different order of magnitude. The Russian leader has created an authoritarian system that oversees fraudulent elections and the assassinations of political opponents, for which President Biden called him a “killer.” With keys to one of the world’s most powerful nuclear arsenals and growing territorial ambitions in Europe, Putin has become the U.S.’s chief antagonist.
Labeling him a “despot,” the Treasury Department took the unusual step in 2022 of blacklisting him for invading Ukraine, putting him in the same company with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus.
Newsweek also recently reported that the Ukrainian military discovered a Starlink terminal on a downed Russian drone. It isn’t clear whether Musk had anything to do with that, but it certainly raises more than a few questions. At the very least, we need to know why Starlink hasn’t done a better job of denying access to the Russian military. You know, because they’re an enemy nation that started a war with one of our country’s allies, and the last thing a U.S. company should be doing right now is helping the Russians.
Even if Musk hasn’t betrayed any state secrets or directly interfered with U.S. foreign policy, this is bad. Any other contractor caught red-handed like this would have already lost their security clearance. Sure, he’s rich, powerful and well-connected inside the ongoing far-right power grab. Regardless of how rich he is and how important SpaceX is to the federal government, this cannot be swept under the rug. The public needs to demand investigations. Drag Musk in front of Congress to testify. We can’t just let this go away. The true extent of Musk’s communications with Putin and other Russian officials has to be exposed.
Then again, if Trump wins in November, none of this will really matter. Musk will be rewarded, most likely with a position in the new Trump administration, the aid we send Ukraine will be cut off and things will only get worse from there. So fingers crossed that Harris wins and enough of a backbone to demand a serious investigation of Musk. If that ends in federal charges and the government forcing him out of SpaceX, so be it. He should have thought about that before he started taking an enemy dictator’s calls.