NASA chief calls for investigation into report that Musk and Putin speak regularly

CNN
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NASA Administrator Bill Nelson on Friday called for an investigation into A Wall Street Journal report SpaceX founder and Donald Trump ally Elon Musk and Russian President Vladimir Putin have been in “regular contact” since late 2022.

The report, which said the SpaceX founder discussed “personal and business topics and geopolitical tensions” with the Russian leader, raises national security concerns because SpaceX’s ties to NASA and the US military may have given Musk access to sensitive government and US intelligence information.

“I don’t know that this story is true. I think it should be investigated,” Nelson told Semaphore’s Burgess Everett. “If the story is true that there were multiple conversations between Elon Musk and the Russian president, I think that would be troubling, especially for NASA, the Department of Defense, and some intelligence agencies.”

Some US officials raised counterintelligence concerns last year about Musk’s interactions with US adversaries such as Russia, but the US intelligence community was wary of looking into those interactions because Musk is a US citizen, an official familiar with the matter told CNN.

Several White House officials told the newspaper that they were not aware of the contact between Musk and Putin, and the newspaper said that knowledge of the discussions “appears to be top secret in the government.” These discussions were confirmed to the newspaper by numerous current and former American, European and Russian officials.

In one case, the newspaper cited a request from Putin to Musk not to activate Starlink satellite internet service across Taiwan “as a favor to Chinese leader Xi Jinping.”

Musk did not respond to the magazine’s requests for comment.

National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said on Friday that he had seen the report but that the White House was “not in a position to confirm it” and referred questions to Musk. A Pentagon spokesperson told the newspaper that the Department of Defense does not comment on “the security clearance, review, or status of any individual, or on personnel security policy matters in the context of reports about the actions of any individual.”

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told the newspaper that Musk and Putin had only one phone call in which they discussed “space as well as current and future technologies.”

Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in early 2022, Musk’s support for Ukraine — exemplified by SpaceX’s provision of Starlink services — has waned as his public statements about the conflict have become more consistent with those of Trump, who has said he would negotiate an end to the conflict. War quickly. The satellite internet terminals provided by Musk’s company were a vital source of communications for the Ukrainian military, allowing it to fight and stay connected even as mobile phone and internet networks were destroyed.

Musk’s Starlink “is essential for Ukraine in particular because they really can’t continue this war without” its services, Dmitry Alperovitch, a Russia and cybersecurity expert, told CNN’s Alex Marquardt on Friday on “CNN News Central.”

After Musk announced his early support for Ukraine, SpaceX suddenly asked the Pentagon to pay tens of millions of dollars a month to fund the Starlink project in Ukraine and ease the burden on SpaceX. In response to this report, Musk suddenly announced on Twitter that he was withdrawing the funding request. Around the same time, Musk used a poll on After Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky questioned Musk’s preference for war, the tech entrepreneur responded that he “remains very supportive of Ukraine” but fears “a massive escalation.”

SpaceX had previously limited its Starlink signal to areas controlled by Ukrainian forces, hindering potential progress that would have relied on Starlink communications. SpaceX then expanded its reach to the rest of the country, and earlier this year, Ukrainian defense intelligence claimed to have confirmed Russian forces’ use of Starlink satellite communications in the occupied territories. Russia appears to be purchasing the stations from third parties; SpaceX said it has not done business of any kind with the Russian government or its military, and that its service will not operate in Russia. The statement did not address whether it would work in occupied Ukraine.

Ukraine’s claim follows revelations in Musk’s biography, written by Walter Isaacson, that the satellite system was used in warfare. According to an excerpt from the book, Musk did not agree to a Ukrainian request to operate his company’s Starlink satellite communications network near the coast of Crimea last year to impede a Ukrainian lightning attack on the Russian naval fleet.

Musk’s decision, which left Ukrainian officials begging him to turn the satellites back on, was driven by intense fear that Russia would respond to a Ukrainian attack on Crimea with nuclear weapons, a fear reinforced by Musk’s conversations with senior Russian officials, according to Space.com. American. Isaacson.

In October 2022, Musk denied US political scientist Ian Bremmer’s claim that he had spoken with Putin about the war and a proposed “peace plan” to end the conflict.

Musk, who is also Tesla CEO and owner of X, has emerged as a major financial figure in this year’s presidential election. He pumped nearly $44 million in October into a super PAC working to return Trump to the White House — bringing the billionaire’s total donations to the group to nearly $119 million — and appeared with Trump on the campaign trail earlier this month. In Butler, Pennsylvania.

Musk also held his own town halls last week in Pennsylvania, where he urged voters to support Trump and promoted several debunked conspiracy theories about the 2020 election. The two have publicly discussed Musk’s potential government role.

In recent days, Musk has also offered $1 million daily sweepstakes to voters in swing states, which has drawn scrutiny from the US Department of Justice. Despite the Justice Department’s warning that the payments may be illegal, Musk’s super PAC awarded two $1 million prizes to registered voters in Michigan and Wisconsin on Thursday.

This story has been updated with additional details.

CNN’s Shaun Lingas, Jackie Wattles and Kanita Iyer contributed to this report.