A national security review of billionaire Elon Musk is the topic of a White House pursuit of a secretive review, as the Biden Administration is concerned that Musk has threatened to withdraw Starling satellite access from Ukraine and is, in an unrelated matter, attempting to purchase Twitter, the home of left-wing propaganda.
Musk, the co-founder and CEO of Tesla, is the richest person in the world with a net worth of $241 billion. Musk has been providing internet via satellite to Ukraine since internet was cut by Russia but has said he hasn’t received any support from the United States government for doing so, and he would not provide the service forever.
Some 20,000 Starlink satellite units have been donated to Ukraine, with Musk saying on Friday the operation has cost SpaceX $80 so far this year and will be $100 million by the end of the year.”
According to Bloomberg, the Biden White House is upset that some of Musk’s public statements have seemed to favor Russia, which has invaded Ukraine and conducted war on the country that has led to the loss of a reported 6.3 thousand lives since the start of the war in late February. The Biden Administration is looking for a legal path to put the intelligence community into motion to investigate both Musk and Starlink.
One avenue for an investigation the Administration is considering is investigating Musk’s Twitter acquisition through the deep-state Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, according to the Daily Caller.
CFIUS is an interagency committee authorized to review transactions involving foreign investment in the United States and “certain real estate transactions by foreign persons,” in order to determine the effect of such transactions on U.S. security.
In September, Joe Biden expanded CFIUS’ mandate to include reviews of foreign investors with third party ties to foreign governments, as well as to address cybersecurity risks and risks to U.S. persons’ sensitive data. Read the executive order here.
“If that sounds vague, it is,” Arthur Herman, a senior fellow and director of the Hudson Institute’s Quantum Alliance Initiative, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
In the same news cycle, Musk said he was considering cutting the Twitter workforce by 75%, should the acquisition proceed. Twitter shares fell 5.1% as the market opened in New York on Friday and closed down 4.88%.
