‘We're All Paying for It': Kash Patel Called Out Elon Musk for Getting Rich Off Taxpayers
During the Biden administration, Patel — a former intelligence and Defense Department official under Trump, who had considered elevating him to the top of the FBI or CIA in the closing days of his first term only to be dissuaded by Cabinet members — made plenty of media appearances and hosted a podcast, Kash's Corner. (The show aired on EpochTV, part of the far-right Epoch Media Group, which is known to amplify conspiracy theories and misinformation.) In the course of various interviews and conversations, Patel repeatedly criticized Musk, labeling him a monopolist, accusing him of mass data collection, advocating for more aggressive government oversight of his companies, and arguing that his wealth came from federal contracts, i.e., taxpayer dollars.
More from Rolling Stone
Trump Orders Independent Agencies to Follow His Read of the Law, Not the Courts
Elon Musk's Empty Hunt for Condoms Is Causing Real Harm
Eric Adams' Lawyers Offered Trump DOJ an 'Ever-Present Partner'
'He is literally launching this thing called satlink, which almost no one knows about, but he's been building for five years, which is free Wi-Fi for the world,' Patel said on Greg Gutfeld's Fox News show in December 2021, referring to Starlink, the telecom subsidiary of Musk's SpaceX. He explained, 'I mean, we're all paying for it, this is why he's so rich,' going on to call the billionaire the 'biggest' contractor for the Department of Defense. (While Musk is not quite the largest Pentagon contractor, SpaceX does have some $22 billion in government contracts.) Patel added, 'I'll never get hired from him now.'
The amount of federal funds channeled to Musk's corporate empire is under renewed scrutiny as his so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) slashes away at the administrative state and directs the firings of tens of thousands of federal workers in what it claims is a campaign to reduce wasteful spending. Musk's highly public role in directing and championing the cuts has also raised questions about his glaring conflicts of interest, based on his lucrative contracts, but Musk, Trump, and other White House officials have casually brushed aside concerns about transparency and corruption.
In 2022, Patel took issue with Musk's $44 billion takeover of Twitter (now X), asserting on Kash's Corner that the CEO had too much control over Americans' private data and could even make it available to the Chinese Communist Party. He also took another shot at Musk's government contracts. 'He's already got Tesla, he's already got the SpaceX program and the government DOD contracts, which I believe to be the largest portion of his income,' Patel said. 'And now he'll have Twitter. So what scares me is, you want to talk about a monopoly, he is the ultimate monopoly.'
'Is he just going to buy everything up and then become one ginormous trust, for lack of a better word, a monopoly, which is supposedly illegal under our law, under antitrust laws?' Patel wondered. 'And then what's he going to do with all the data? That's my concern: the data collection.' He speculated, 'What do you do with everyone's personal information? Do you allow the [Chinese Communist Party] to have backdoors like other companies, like TikTok, have done in the past, and sell Americans' data or provide Americans' data directly to the CCP for future use against Americans and American interest?'
That episode of Kash's Corner found Patel urging lawmakers to take a stronger look at Musk's access to Americans' personal information. 'I think Congress is going to have a lot of oversight to do,' he said before expressing skepticism that Musk was really committed to turning Twitter into a 'free speech platform free of censorship.'
Patel was especially livid regarding the 'Twitter Files,' a dud exposé series from several journalists with whom Musk shared internal company documents that supposedly showed how Democrats in government had ordered the company to censor the Hunter Biden laptop story in 2020. The materials included no evidence of this, and Patel was soon convinced that Musk was actually in on the alleged 'coverup' of the involvement of the FBI and Justice Department in 'rigging' the 2020 election by suppressing the story. 'I've been blasting Elon, and it's fine, I don't really care,' Patel said in an appearance at Turning Point USA's America Fest convention in December 2022. 'I don't need him as a friend. But this partial release of documents is almost a version of censorship itself.' That same month, he went on the podcast War Room with Steve Bannon, by far the most outspoken Musk hater in MAGA world, and accused Twitter's new owner of running a 'disinformation' operation by withholding company files from the public.
If Patel has lately made an effort to play nice with Musk, the most influential person in Trump's orbit over the past several months, it hasn't been all that visible: The nominee for FBI director isn't posting in support of Musk or DOGE on X. Musk, however, earlier this month endorsed Patel to lead the bureau, sharing an X post that claimed his confirmation would cause many agents to quit. He wrote: 'Confirm Kash now.'
With Patel expected to oversee a purge of FBI employees seen as insufficiently loyal to Trump or involved in Capitol riot prosecutions — which may already be underway — he and Musk are likely to find themselves on the same page despite any past differences. Patel has suggested that the Jan. 6 insurrection was planned by federal agents, while Musk has embraced false narratives about Trump supporters remaining peaceful as they stormed the building to halt the certification of Biden's 2020 election victory, and is pushing for mass layoffs across federal agencies. In some cases, the Trump administration has scrambled to rehire employees deemed essential only once they were dismissed.
But outside a shared crusade against the anti-Trump 'deep state,' points of friction between Patel and Musk could certainly persist. We're just a month into the second MAGA regime, and the schisms should only multiply from here.
Best of Rolling Stone
Every Super Bowl Halftime Show, Ranked From Worst to Best
The United States of Weed
Gaming Levels Up
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
The Hill
4 minutes ago
- The Hill
Trump doesn't have to quit UNESCO again because we never lawfully rejoined
President Trump recently announced that the United States was quitting the United Nations Economic, Social, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) for the third time. This is good news – UNESCO has championed gender ideology in education, discriminatory DEI policies, and the entire litany of woke doctrines. It has also worked to erase Jewish history in the Holy Land. But the administration did not need to bother with formally withdrawing from the treaty — from a constitutional perspective, the U.S. hasn't been a member at least since Trump first quit it in 2017. When Biden sought to rejoin the Paris-based agency in 2023, he neglected to seek authorization from Congress. No one made a big deal of it then, but it means that, for domestic law purposes, the U.S. never actually rejoined. This is an important point with implications for numerous international organizations, especially as the administration sets out on an agenda of U.N. reform. Membership in international organizations was not supposed to be a political revolving door. Congress authorizes membership at the outset. After the U.S. leaves, a whole new congressional authorization must be obtained by any president wishing to rejoin. Under the Constitution, the president can only bring the country into a treaty with the 'consent' of two-thirds of the Senate. That is a substantial hurdle, and deliberately so: Commitments to foreign countries can be harder to pull out of than domestic ones. They can become a way of imposing obligations on the country that are then out of reach of the democratic process. In the 20th century, presidents have often relied on the approval of a majority of both Houses instead, a dubious practice but now widely followed. When the U.S. first joined UNESCO in 1946 (and the World Health Organization in 1948), President Truman was acting pursuant a law passed by both Houses authorizing him to do so. But Congress did not reauthorize Biden's reentry to UNESCO. Instead, he treated the 1946 authorization as a lifetime membership, when in fact it was only a one-time pass. If the U.S. quit a treaty that the Senate had ratified — say the NATO treaty — then a decision to rejoin would be subject to a new requirement of advice and consent. Congressional authorization is a stand-in for Senate ratification and should be subject to the same rules. Consider a parallel case: If a president fires a senate-confirmed appointee, and he or a subsequent president wishes to return him to the same post, no one would argue that he could do so simply on the grounds that the Senate had previously confirmed him. Indeed, Andrew Jackson's Attorney General resigned from his position, and was then reappointed to it — only to be rejected by the Senate. As a statutory matter, the 1946 agreement on UNESCO allowed the president to 'accept membership' — not accept, and accept, and accept again. If a congressional authorization is good for infinite rounds of quitting and rejoining, it makes getting out of international agreements harder than getting in – exactly the opposite of what the Framers intended. The argument of perpetual authorization was invented by Jimmy Carter, who purported to rejoin the International Labor Organization in 1980 based on a 1934 authorization. President Bush neglected to seek congressional approval when he rejoined UNESCO in 2002, nearly two decades after Reagan quit. Neither instance attracted much attention, and two modern actions do not prove a constitutional rule. There is a good argument for the Trump administration having withdrawn from UNESCO as if it were a member — to avoid any doubt or subsequent quibbling. But the administration should clarify that it is 'quitting' only out of an excess of caution, and does not see the U.S. as properly joined, which is consistent with its nonpayment of any dues. To avoid abuse by future administrations, Congress should repeal the antiquated authorizations for UNESCO and WHO, which Trump also announced withdrawal from. If a subsequent president wants to rejoin, he should have to sell it to Congress on the organization's existing records, not the hopes and dreams of the 1940s.
The Hill
4 minutes ago
- The Hill
Senate Democrats launch radio ad attacking GOP over cuts to rural radio funding
The Senate Democrats' campaign arm is launching a new radio ad Wednesday attacking Republicans for slashing funding for rural radio stations as a part of more than $1 billion Republicans made in cuts to public broadcasting in their recissions package. 'Thank you for listening to your local radio station. But stations like these might not be around for long,' a narrator says in the 30-second ad, which was first shared with The Hill. 'Last month in D.C., Republican Senators cut radio funding, voting to end weather alerts, community news and our way to stay connected,' the narrator continued. 'Rural America relies on radio. But Republican politicians left us behind.' They added, 'We can't trust them to fight for us.' The ads are being aired in recognition of National Radio Day, and they're expected to run in rural stations in Alaska, Iowa, Maine, North Carolina, Ohio and Texas, all of which Senate Democrats are eyeing as potential pick-up opportunities next year. 'Rural communities rely on local radio to stay connected on everything from local news to lifesaving alerts about severe weather — but Republican Senators left them behind,' Maeve Coyle, a spokeswoman for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC), said in a statement. 'Republican senators will be forced to explain to their constituents why they're robbing the programs that support their communities in order to pay for a giveaway to billionaires,' she added. President Trump signed a recissions package last month, which rescinds around $9 billion Congress had previously approved for funding for the Corporation of Public Broadcasting (CPB), which helps fund NPR and PBS and its affiliates, and global aid programs. CPB is contending with more than $1 billion in cuts alone. Federal funding makes up a smaller percentage of the money NPR and PBS rely on, but rural stations have already warned it will impact them more severely since it makes up a higher proportion of their overall funding. Republicans have attacked NPR and PBS, arguing they're liberally biased and their programs push 'radical left positions,' which its leaders have pushed back on. Contending with the cuts, the CPB announced it would begin to shut down, with its president Patricia Harrison saying in a statement 'we now face the difficult reality of closing our operations.'
San Francisco Chronicle
4 minutes ago
- San Francisco Chronicle
Newsom is the face of California's redistricting push. That could help him — and hurt the plan
SACRAMENTO — By launching a campaign to redraw California's congressional districts, Gov. Gavin Newsom has once again placed himself at the center of the national political conversation. That's helpful to Newsom as he positions himself to run for president in 2028 — something he has not explicitly admitted but has long been evident in his efforts to build a national donor base and boost his visibility in other states, including a recent visit to South Carolina. But it could prove detrimental to the redistricting campaign itself if Republicans can convince voters to view the measure as a power grab by Newsom, rather than the Democrats' framing as a fight against President Donald Trump. For loyal Democratic voters, the key constituency Newsom would need to win in a presidential primary, that framing seems to be working. Newsom has surged in popularity on social media with his persistent attacks on Trump and is earning praise from liberals hungry for their leaders to take on the president more aggressively. 'He's staking out a position as the kind of person who fights,' said Hans Noel, a government professor at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. 'A lot of Democrats want to see that.' To successfully campaign for president, Newsom needs to shore up support from Democratic leaders and boost his popularity outside of California, Noel said. With the redistricting measure, Newsom risks criticism from people who disagree with his tactics and don't want to see Democrats abandon independent redistricting. But the campaign is undeniably helping him introduce himself to voters outside the Golden State who may not be familiar with him. Being at the forefront of the campaign might help him with a future presidential run, but it could hamper the campaign's chances within California, said Rob Stutzman, a Republican strategist who previously worked for Arnold Schwarzenegger. Democrats describe the measure as a fight against Trump and a direct response to efforts in Texas to redraw maps in favor of Republicans. Newsom has said he'd abandon the effort if Texas dropped its plans. But it's also something that would hand California Democrats more power, as Republican opponents are already pointing out. 'Every issue that matters to Californians has been put to the side so that (Newsom) and other politicians can seize back power,' Assembly Member Carl DeMaio, R-San Diego, said during a news conference opposing the redistricting measure on Monday. 'The reason why we're here today is Gov. Gavin Newsom's failing presidential campaign needs a little boost.' Democratic lawmakers plan to vote on Thursday to place the measure on the ballot in a Nov. 4 special election. They'll have a remarkably short span of time to convince voters to support the proposition, which would redraw California's congressional maps to give an advantage to Democrats. That would temporarily roll back a reform passed by voters in 2010, when they removed power to draw congressional districts from the Legislature and gave it to an independent commission with equal numbers of Republicans and Democrats. That reform was good in theory, Democrats say, but in practice dilutes Californians' power in Congress because other states continue to draw their districts in a partisan way. The proposed redistricting measure would replace the independent commission's maps with maps favoring Democrats for the 2026, 2028 and 2030 elections. After the 2030 census, the independent commission would draw new maps free of partisan interference. It's not clear yet whether Newsom will continue to be the face of the campaign. The fight was his idea, and he has led the charge so far — hosting regular press conferences and doing a blitz of interviews to promote the plan. He narrates the campaign's first ad, which features a speech he gave in Sacramento criticizing Texas Republicans' redistricting moves. Voters tend to be skeptical of efforts by politicians to increase their own power. The more Newsom is seen as the face of the measure, the more likely voters are to see it as a self-serving ploy and reject it, Stutzman said. 'Whether this passes is a more difficult question, but the opportunity it provides for Newsom I think is very valuable,' Stutzman said. 'He certainly seems intent on making the most of it.' Julia Azari, a politics professor at Marquette University in Wisconsin, said Newsom's antagonism of Trump somewhat mirrors what Kamala Harris did in 2017. While serving as California's junior senator, Harris staked out a reputation for taking Trump administration officials to task during oversight hearings, an image that helped propel her candidacy for president in 2020. In the end, Harris wasn't able to out-compete the frontrunners in that race — Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders — who both had many more years in the national spotlight. Getting out in front of voters so early has a potential downside, Azari noted, which is that it will give voters more time to learn unflattering things about Newsom's record as governor of California. But Biden faced the same challenge in 2020, which he overcame to win the presidency. The redistricting fight is particularly well-suited for these purposes. It centers Newsom in a major national political story. And it allows him to position himself at the front of the pack of Democrats vying for a nomination in 2028 while uniting, not attacking them, Noel said. Ludovic Blain, who runs the progressive donor group the California Donor Table, said he's not always aligned politically with the governor, but on this issue, they're on the same page. He said progressives are looking for politicians who will stand up to Trump, and Newsom is rising to the occasion. He said he doesn't necessarily see a major downside for Newsom if the ballot measure fails. 'Voters want to see fighters,' he said. 'The question of whether they're successful — that's secondary because you can't be successful if you don't fight.'
