Money needs to be out of politics NOW. Elon Musk shows exactly why.

The richest man in the world logged on to the social media platform he owns and issued an ominous threat. What set him off was a story in Politico reporting that if Democrats win control of Congress next week, they plan to investigate him: his time running DOGE, the federal contracts his companies hold, and reports that he ordered Starlink service slowed for Ukraine’s military. To recap, a man whose company is paid billions of dollars by the federal government is warning members of Congress that if they look into how he got that money, he will come after them, and after whoever he decides is behind them. And he isn’t just posting. He’s paying. According to a Washington Post analysis of federal filings, Musk has now put about $446 million into this year’s midterm elections alone. That’s the most any individual donor has ever given. It’s well beyond the roughly $290 million he spent electing Donald Trump in 2024. In September, he gave $158 million to the main super PAC backing Republican Senate candidates in just two checks. He’s put another $10 million into a group backing Ken Paxton in Texas. We have never seen anything like this. And we absolutely should not accept it. Elon Musk isn’t just the richest man in the world. He got there, in large part, with the help of the American taxpayer. SpaceX has received more than $20 billion in federal contracts, with NASA and the Pentagon among its biggest customers. Starlink has become essential infrastructure for our military and our allies. His companies depend on decisions made by the very government he’s now spending hundreds of millions of dollars to shape. Think about what that means. The man whose company is paid billions by the federal government is spending a fortune to decide who runs the federal government. The senators he helps elect will vote on defense budgets that include his contracts. The agencies that regulate his companies answer to the president he helped put in office. Even if every one of those decisions were made in good faith, how could anyone know? Here’s the part most people don’t realize: we already decided, decades ago, that this kind of thing is wrong. For more than 75 years, federal law has barred government contractors from making political contributions. The whole point is to avoid even the appearance that taxpayer-funded contracts are for sale. Courts have upheld that ban even as they’ve struck down other campaign finance laws. Regulators have enforced it against contractors who tried to give to super PACs. So how is Musk allowed to do this? Because of a loophole. The ban covers the company holding the contract, and federal regulators read it narrowly. In their view, Musk’s spending doesn’t count, because it comes from him as an individual rather than from SpaceX or Tesla. The company can’t spend a dime. But the man who controls the company can spend nearly half a billion dollars in a single election.