A bombshell story last night from the Wall Street Journal reported that billionaire #Elon #Musk, one of the richest men in the world, who is backing the election of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump with a daily million-dollar sweepstakes giveaway and gifts of tens of millions to the campaign,
💥has been in regular contact with Russian president #Vladimir #Putin since late 2022.

Reporters Thomas Grove, Warren P. Strobel, Aruna Viswanatha, Gordon Lubold, and Sam Schechner said that the conversations “touch on personal topics, business and geopolitical tensions.” 

Musk’s SpaceX, which operates the Starlink satellite system, won a $1.8 billion contract with U.S. military and intelligence agencies in 2021.
It is the major rocket launcher for NASA and the Pentagon,
and Musk has a security clearance;
he says it is a top-secret clearance.

Today, NASA administrator Bill Nelson called for an investigation into the story.

“If the story is true that there have been multiple conversations between Elon Musk and the president of Russia,” Nelson told Burgess Everett of Semafor,
“then I think that would be concerning, particularly for NASA,
for the Department of Defense,
for some of the intelligence agencies.”

Musk appears to be making a bid for control of the Republican Party for a number of possible reasons,
including so he can continue to score federal contracts
and because the high tariffs Trump has promised to place on Chinese imports would guarantee that Musk would have leverage in the electrical vehicle market. 

But Musk has competition for control of the party.

Today, Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and House speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA),
who lead the establishment Republican faction and the MAGAs, respectively,
and thus are usually at loggerheads, issued a joint statement condemning Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris for “labeling [Trump] as a ‘fascist.’”

They suggest she is “inviting yet another would-be assassin to try robbing voters of their choice before Election Day.” 

Observers immediately pointed out that, in fact, it is Trump who has repeatedly called Harris a fascist
—as well as a Marxist and a communist
—and that those calling Trump a fascist are former members of his own administration
like former White House chief of staff General John Kelly,
or leaders like former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Mark Milley,
whom Trump himself appointed to his position and who called Trump “the most dangerous person to this country.”

Harris’s contribution to this discussion was that when CNN’s Anderson Cooper asked Harris directly if she thinks Trump is a fascist at a town hall this week, she answered:
“Yes, I do. And I also believe that the people who know him best on this subject should be trusted.” 

Aside from the gaslighting of attacking Harris for something that Trump is the one doing,
the statement seemed a calculated attempt to demonstrate Republican solidarity.

But it was glaringly obvious that #McConnell and #Johnson found that solidarity only in attacking Harris.

Their statement contained no praise of Trump. 

The struggle over the Republican Party also seemed evident in yesterday’s decision by the billionaire owner of the Los Angeles Times, biotech tycoon #Patrick #Soon-#Shiong, to kill that paper’s planned endorsement of Harris.

Choosing not to make an endorsement in the race, Soon-Shiong said that he thought an endorsement would “add to the division” in the country.

Elon Musk praised his decision.

Today the Washington Post also decided not to make an endorsement in the presidential race, despite the fact a piece endorsing Harris was already drafted.

Publisher #William #Lewis said the paper was returning to its roots of not endorsing presidential candidates, although it has endorsed candidates for decades and did so in its early years as well.

His statement seemed a weak cover for the evident wish of the Washington Post’s owner, #Jeff #Bezos, to avoid antagonizing Trump.

Bezos gives Musk a run for his money at being the richest man in the world.

But while Musk wants high tariffs against China to protect his access to electric vehicle markets, Bezos’s fortune comes from Amazon, and high tariffs would shatter his business.

https://heathercoxrichardson.substack.com/p/october-25-2024