Why Elon Musk is skipping around on stage for Donald Trump

Why has Elon Musk, whose Twitter/X is reportedly bleeding ad revenue, gone all in on supporting misinformation maven Donald Trump? Why is he bouncing around stages sporting a number of shades of MAGA hat? Why take a look at election regulation now, so near November 5, with a dubious $1 million lottery for registered voters in swing states who’ve signed Musk’s equally dubious petition?

These questions are being raised on the marketing campaign path, after VP candidate Tim Walz joked in a speech Tuesday that Musk was successfully Trump’s VP decide. In a made-for-memes second, Walz puzzled why Musk had began “dancing like a dipshit” on the former president’s rallies.

The reply is probably not that Musk has simply turn out to be a rabid red-pilled true believer. The proprietor’s X feed has lengthy been stuffed with far-right fibs that aren’t getting Community Notes, and but even now he appears reluctant to go down the deepest MAGA rabbit holes — for instance, declining to obtain a ebook of conspiracy theories on the 2020 election at his first solo Pennsylvania event this week.

Nor is this about Musk’s tax invoice. You would possibly assume that may be the primary motive for the world’s richest man to vault a candidate like Trump, who guarantees to chop his efficient tax price, to the top of the federal authorities. However based on ProPublica’s IRS investigations, Musk probably pays little to no federal income tax already. Trump would attempt to lower the tax rate on sales of stock, one thing Musk does quite a bit — nevertheless it’s Congress that in the end decides whether or not to chop taxes, not the president.

No, it appears to be like more and more like Musk’s fundamental concern is evading penalties from the feds, in line with an exhaustive New York Times report.

4 of Musk’s corporations face a complete of “a minimum of 20” federal probes. The Departments of Justice, Labor and Transportation are wanting into authorized violations and discrimination lawsuits at Tesla, SpaceX and Neuralink. And X? The SEC and the FTC are throughout it for alleged violations around Musk’s $44 billion buy. Simply this month, Musk was a no-show at a court-ordered SEC interview.

Musk has a historical past of dragging the SEC and different regulators by way of lengthy court docket battles, then paying fines that pale compared to his wealth. However now, with so many fronts to battle on, 2025 stands out as the yr that the billionaire’s disdain lastly catches up with him given the quantity of investigations detailed within the New York Instances report.

On prime of his federal battles, Musk is dealing with a dozen non-public lawsuits from Tesla homeowners’ households, three of which are slated to go to trial in 2025. The lawsuits allege that Musk made Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (FSD) capabilities appear extra superior than they have been, leading to a number of deaths and accidents. The Nationwide Freeway Security Visitors Administration and the DOJ are wanting into the identical factor.

Tweet may have been deleted

On the similar time, Musk at present holds an unimaginable quantity of sway inside the federal authorities – as certainly one of its largest contractors. The Instances dug up practically $16 billion in contracts for his corporations over the past decade, the overwhelming majority with the Pentagon and NASA. And Musk’s reliance on authorities cash is rising: final yr alone, his corporations received $3 billion from a complete of 17 federal businesses.

That is 3 billion causes yearly to stymie any investigations that might carry Musk’s home of contracts crashing down.

And this is what Trump has provided Musk: his personal “authorities effectivity fee” that may advocate cuts to federal businesses. Crucially, it will additionally recommend modifications to laws. Trump and his Project 2025 supporters have vowed a sweeping purge of federal government employees. In a second Trump administration, Musk could possibly be one of the vital highly effective voices on the desk deciding the path of that purge.

There it is: Not a conspiracy concept, however an out-in-the-open provide to let Musk torment his investigators. Musk might gown it up as “D.O.G.E.,” referencing one of his favorite memes, however this is how the Instances report places it: The division “would primarily give the world’s richest man and a significant authorities contractor the ability to control the regulators who maintain sway over his corporations, amounting to a probably monumental battle of curiosity.”

Given the eye-popping amount of cash concerned, “probably monumental battle of curiosity” could possibly be an understatement. In any case, rising Musk’s $3 billion-a-year authorities enterprise — and safeguarding his companies from investigations that will tank the inventory — is price bouncing around swing states waving large checks in any variety of MAGA hats.