During the hot phase of the US parliamentary election, the richest man in the world became a record donor for Donald Trump's Republicans - especially in Texas, which is important for Musk.
Elon Musk at the Conservative Political Analysis Conference (CPAC): The billionaire particularly supported the Republican election campaign in Texas. Photo: Jose Luis Magana/AP/dpa
Elon Musk donated more than $440 million through various channels during the US general election to help Republicans in Texas, among other places.
Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who is backed by Musk, is under pressure over investigations and is in a neck-and-neck race for a Senate seat.
Musk justified his support with concerns that a Democratic majority in both chambers of parliament could mean the end of democracy.
Washington. Tech billionaire Elon Musk is again spending hundreds of millions of dollars to influence the outcome of a US election. According to preliminary figures, the richest person in the world donated a record amount of more than $440 million through various channels for the US general election. And the full amount won't be known until after voting ends next Tuesday.
The head of the car manufacturer Tesla and the space company SpaceX, known for his right-wing political views, is primarily trying to prevent Donald Trump's Republican Party from losing control of the US Senate. Musk's focus is particularly on the state of Texas, where his companies and himself are now based. He is currently sitting on an estimated fortune of $865 billion, mostly in shares of SpaceX and Tesla.
Ken Paxton, the attorney general of Texas, who now wants to move into the Senate, is the main beneficiary of Musk's money. The 63-year-old Paxton, who defeated incumbent Senator John Cornyn in the Republican primary, is a difficult candidate. An attorney general who was the target of investigations, among other things, because of allegations of dubious stock transactions.
The Republican fund, which contributes money to their candidates' campaigns, supported Cornyn in the primary. Because of the estimate that up to $200 million would have to be spent to get Paxton over the finish line, the Texas Tribune wrote.
Do Musk's donations make a difference?
But the Republicans have Elon Musk for such cases. Within a few weeks, more than $150 million suddenly flowed into Paxton's election campaign, which is in a neck-and-neck race with Democrat James Talarico in Texas, which has recently been Republican-friendly. Musk could “single-handedly” change the course of the midterm elections with his money, Brendan Glavin from the nonprofit organization OpenSecrets told the news channel CNN.
Observers noticed an identical approach: Musk first paid $75 million and then another $83 million to the Republican umbrella fund. A short time later, he sent exactly the same amounts to the Texas PAC (Political Action Committee) fund, which finances Paxton's election campaign. Texas TV is now churning out commercials praising Paxton as a tough attorney general and accusing Talarico of being out of step with Texas values.
Election campaign on X
On his online platform There, the Tech Titan claims that Talarico hates Texas and America, wants to make children transgender - and, in general, that there is something wrong with him. Talarico countered that there was something wrong with the political system “that allows a trillionaire to buy his own personal US senator.”
Musk millions also flowed into other election races across the USA. Most recently, he also tried to justify his support for the Republicans in public. Musk wrote on
Because the party would, among other things, declare all migrants living illegally in the USA as citizens and expand the Supreme Court in order to quickly have a majority there, he claimed. Whether such fear scenarios help to mobilize more Republican supporters to go to the polls will become clear in a few days.
What Musk left unmentioned are his own interests. The tech billionaire would like to merge Tesla and SpaceX - that would ultimately give him full control of the electric car manufacturer, where he is currently the boss, but not the dominant shareholder. And Musk had already said, among other things, that he was hesitant to build “a robot army” at Tesla as long as someone could drive him out of the executive chair.
Texas has been a hospitable home for Musk's company. Paxton took the Facebook group Meta to court, accusing it of not protecting children enough, and Google with data protection criticism. But when his state-based platform
Musk donated more than $250 million to Trump during the presidential election two years ago. Without him, Trump would not have moved into the White House for the second time, Musk claimed last summer at the height of a public dispute with the US President. In the meantime, the richest and most powerful man in the world have been able to mend their breach. But a repeat of the situation in which Musk was entrusted with cutting US government spending via the Doge committee and sat at the cabinet table seems hard to imagine.
