Elon Musk’s Reign of Corruption Chronicled in Elizabeth Warren Report
Story by Tim Dickinson (Rolling Stone Magazine)
As Elon Musk departs the Trump White House - at least officially - a new Senate report examines how the world’s richest man leveraged his access to the levers of federal power to boost his myriad personal businesses including his electric vehicle company Tesla, aerospace contractor SpaceX, social media platform X, and brain chip firm Neuralink.
Musk is leaving his post as a “special government employee” - a status that limited his stint in the executive branch to 130 days. As Donald Trump made clear in a press conference, where he gave Musk a “key” to the White House, the billionaire’s influence will live on, as will his crusade against his own regulators.
Issued by Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), the report is titled “Special Interests Over the Public Interest: Elon Musk’s 130 Days in the Trump Administration” and features a list of 130 actions by Musk, his companies, and family members that “raise questions about corruption, ethics, and conflicts of interest.”
Musk, of course, was Trump’s biggest benefactor in the 2024 campaign, spending nearly $300 million to put Trump and Republican candidates into office. He then camped out at Mar-a-Lago during the presidential transition and moved to Washington with the 47th president. At times appearing to be the nation’s true chief executive, Musk commanded the forces of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and sent critical agencies like USAID (the U.S. Agency for International Development) through the “woodchipper,” likely condemning millions of vulnerable people across the globe to death by preventable diseases.
The Warren report is focused on Elon’s use of political power to boost his businesses, or secure special benefits - from regulatory relief to rich new contracts - that favor his fortunes and his family.
The report clarifies that “Not every action listed… represents a violation of federal law,” but argues instead that “Musk has violated norms at an astonishing pace” while engaging in and supporting actions that are “hurting the American public.” It labels this “scandalous behavior regardless of whether it subjects him to criminal prosecution.”
The Warren report divides its list into 15 categories, which Rolling Stone can exclusively preview below:
1. White House Promotion
The report highlights the time, when Tesla showrooms were increasingly beset by public protests, that Trump turned the White House lawn into a Tesla lot.
2. Lucrative Contracts
The report highlights more than 20 instances of Musk or DOGE helping Musk’s enterprises secure new contracts on an inside track on rich lines of business. For example, it highlights Rolling Stone’s report about how staff at the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) were instructed to find “tens of millions” of dollars for a rich new Starlink contract. As well as a new $100 million NASA contract for SpaceX to launch an asteroid monitoring space telescope.
3. Stymied Investigations
When Trump took office, Musk companies faced federal penalties and enforcement actions totalling up to $2.4 billion, according to the report. Warren highlights CNBC reporting that the federal government has allowed nearly 40 cases against Musk companies to effectively go dormant, while others, including a Department of Justice case against SpaceX for alleged anti-immigrant discrimination in hiring, have been dropped.
4. Hobbled Oversight
The report describes how Musk and the administration have targeted agencies with powers to regulate Musk businesses - including “gutting their staff, throwing sand in the gears of their operations, and embedding DOGE staff loyal to Musk.” A key example of this is the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which has authority to police Musk as he turns X into a payment platform. “Delete CFPB,” Musk has posted, and the administration has tried to bring the agency to its knees. (Read Rolling Stone’s interview with Warren on this topic.)
5. Policy Perks
Musk operates in many highly regulated areas, from launching rockets to biomedical brain implants. The FAA has, under Trump, become a service agency for SpaceX, clearing the way for rocket launches despite frequent catastrophic failures. In Trump’s auto tariff battles, the administration announced that cars with 85 percent domestic content were spared the levy - a category that reportedly only includes Teslas.
6. Special Access
Never before has a presidential megadonor had so much unfettered access to government data, insight, and decisionmakers. The report highlights Musk’s role as a dominant participant at Trump cabinet meetings, despite having no cabinet-level post, who was “privy to upcoming policy changes at the highest level of government,” many of which could boost his bottom line.
7. A Personal Deep State
Musk has been deeply enmeshed, through DOGE, in the HR decisions of the federal government - firing tens of thousands of employees while installing loyalists throughout the bureaucracy. Many of these lackeys now have permanent government gigs, and will be able to carry out Musk-aligned policy without his active direction, including the head of the Federal Communications Commission, which has oversight of radio spectrum needed by Starlink, SpaceX’s satellite internet business.
8. “Personal Parochial Interests”
The report links Musk to the Trump administration’s sudden, curious interest in the cause of white Afrikaaners from South Africa, who have been granted refugee status amid Musk’s trumped-up allegations that they face a “genocide” - even as other truly vulnerable people from around the world are being denied admission to the United States.
9. Intimidation Campaign
The report highlights a Wall Street Journal investigation into perceived threats from X execs who intimated that a planned merger between ad conglomerates might face trouble if ad clients didn’t ramp up their spending on the social media platform.
10. “Weaponizing” Federal Power
The report links Musk to the Trump Federal Trade Commission’s “seemingly baseless” investigation into whether Media Matters colluded with advertisers. X sued the watchdog in late 2023, after Media Matters reported that ads on the platform were being served up against “pro-Nazi” content, leading large brands to suspend campaigns on the platform.
11. “Influence-Peddling in Congress”
The report links Musk’s White House influence to favorable provisions of the House budget bill, including funding for the “Golden Dome,” a space-based missile defense program that seems ready-made for Starlink.
12. Piggyback Deals
Warren’s report highlights dozens of deals that Musk companies have inked with countries that are under tariff threat from the administration, as well as Musk accompanying Trump’s tour of Persian Gulf countries, where the DOGE chief announced deals of his own - including that Neuralink had inked a deal to begin clinical trials in the United Arab Emirates.
13. All in the Family
The report highlights how Musk’s power is translating to deals for family members, including his brother recently inking a deal with Gulf states to mount drone light shows while his dad is reportedly in talks to build a Musk Tower in Dubai.
14. Judicial Meddling
Musk’s fruitless effort to finance a conservative takeover of the Wisconsin state Supreme Court is highlighted in the report, as is his call for judges who oppose Trump to be impeached.
15. “Maximum Transparency” - Denied
Despite his pledge of “maximum transparency” by DOGE, Musk himself has hidden his norms-busting activities behind a veil of secrecy, the report concludes, failing to make public his vast financial holdings, or what if any waivers of federal ethics requirements he may have received.
