Elon Musk

Elon Musk
Basic facts
Organization:	Department of Government Efficiency
Role:	Former special government employee
Location:	Boca Chica, Texas
Education:	University of Pennsylvania

Elon Musk is the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX. He was a political advisor to President Donald Trump (R) during Trump's 2024 presidential campaign and donated $250 million to the campaign via his political action committee, America PAC. Musk served as a special government employee and led the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), an advisory body established by executive order, from January 20, 2025, to May 30, 2025. On July 5, 2025, Musk announced he would form a new political party, the America Party.

Biography

Musk received a B.A. in physics and a B.S. in economics from the University of Pennsylvania in 1997. Musk co-founded X.com, an online bank, in 1999. The company merged with Confinity in 2000 and changed its name to PayPal in 2001.

After leaving X.com/Confinity in 2000, Musk founded SpaceX in 2002, a company that builds and launches spacecraft. He began investing in Tesla, an electric vehicle manufacturer, in 2004 and began serving as the company's CEO in 2008. Musk founded Neuralink and The Boring Company in 2016. The former develops chip implants for people with paralysis, while the latter builds underground tunnels for motorists. Musk also purchased X, formerly Twitter, in 2022 and founded xAI, an artificial intelligence company, in 2023.

Musk was a political advisor to President Trump during Trump's 2024 presidential campaign and donated $250 million to the campaign via his PAC, America PAC. Musk served as a special government employee and led the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), an advisory body established by executive order, from January 20, 2025, to May 30, 2025.

Work and activities

America Party

Following disagreements between Musk and Trump over the passing of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act on July 4, 2025, Musk announced the formation of the America Party the following day. Musk disagreed with the bill's spending commitments and cuts to the electric vehicle tax credit. Musk posted to X: "By a factor of 2 to 1, you want a new political party and you shall have it! When it comes to bankrupting our country with waste & graft, we live in a one-party system, not a democracy. Today, the America Party is formed to give you back your freedom." According to PBS, "Musk pledged to work toward supporting primary challengers for members of Congress who backed the bill. He also said he would support Rep. Thomas Massie, a Kentucky Republican targeted by Trump for opposing the measure."

Trump responded with a post on Truth Social: "The one thing Third Parties are good for is the creation of Complete and Total DISRUPTION & CHAOS, and we have enough of that with the Radical Left Democrats, who have lost their confidence and their minds!"

Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE)

On January 20, 2025, Trump signed an executive order that established DOGE. The temporary advisory body was tasked with "implement[ing] the President’s DOGE Agenda, by modernizing Federal technology and software to maximize governmental efficiency and productivity."

Trump appointed Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to lead DOGE when he announced the organization on November 12, 2024. Ramaswamy announced on January 20, 2025, that he would be stepping down from DOGE, leaving Musk to lead the agency.

Musk served as DOGE's head from January 20, 2025, to May 30, 2025. During his tenure, DOGE reported terminating more than 10,000 federal contracts and saving the federal government $175 billion. Media outlets, including TIME and CBS News, could not independently verify the amount in savings.

According to TIME, DOGE laid off more than 200,000 federal workers and contractors, leading some to sue the organization over the "legality of DOGE's sweeping access to confidential data and the dismantling of agencies." Other legal challenges centered on laying off government employees whose agencies' funding had already been appropriated by Congress.

In an interview with The Washington Post days before his departure from DOGE, Musk said, "The federal bureaucracy situation is much worse than I realized. I thought there were problems, but it sure is an uphill battle trying to improve things in D.C., to say the least. DOGE is just becoming the whipping boy for everything. So, like, something bad would happen anywhere, and we would get blamed for it even if we had nothing to do with it."

America PAC

On May 22, 2024, Musk created America PAC. According to the PAC's website, it supported the following: "Secure Borders, Sensible Spending, Safe Cities, Fair Justice System, Free Speech, and Self-Protection."

Wisconsin Supreme Court election, 2025

America PAC, and associated groups, spent approximately $20 million supporting Brad Schimel in the nonpartisan general election for the Wisconsin Supreme Court held on April 1, 2025. Though justices on the court are nonpartisan, Schimel was the state's former Republican attorney general.

The PAC's campaign efforts included offering $100 to every registered voter who signed a petition against what it said were activist judges. The petition read, "Judges should interpret laws as written, not rewrite them to fit their personal or political agendas. By signing below, I'm rejecting the actions of activist judges who impose their own views and demanding a judiciary that respects its role — interpreting, not legislating." The PAC also gave $1 million checks to two Wisconsin voters for being America PAC spokespeople. In June 2025, the Wisconsin Democracy Campaign filed a lawsuit against the PAC and Musk, alleging the PAC and Musk violated vote bribery and lottery laws.

Susan Crawford, the Democratic-aligned candidate, defeated Schimel 55%-45%.

Presidential election, 2024

America PAC focused on voter turnout efforts in battleground states, such as Pennsylvania, during the presidential election. Efforts included paying registered voters in these states up to $100 per signature to sign and/or refer others to sign a petition supporting the First and Second Amendments. The PAC also gave away $1 million per day to select winners who signed the petition in the final weeks of the election. Both efforts faced lawsuits, including allegations of nonpayment for the former and fraud for the latter. The latter lawsuit claimed the winners were not random as advertised but predetermined.

Musk donated $250 million to Trump's 2024 presidential campaign via the PAC. Following the July 13, 2024, assassination attempt on Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania, Musk endorsed Trump in a post to X.

Musk and Trump appeared together at campaign events, including an online rally hosted by X in August 2024 and a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, in October 2024. Musk was also a speaker at Trump's inauguration rally at Capital One Arena on January 20, 2025.

Trump defeated Kamala Harris (D) 306 electoral votes to 232 electoral votes.

Notable endorsements

See also: Ballotpedia: Our approach to covering endorsements

This section displays endorsements this individual made in elections within Ballotpedia's coverage scope.

Notable candidate endorsements by Elon Musk

Endorsee	Election	Stage	Outcome
Brad Schimel  source  (Nonpartisan)	Wisconsin Supreme Court (2025)	General	Lost General

See also

• What is an influencer?

External links

• America PAC website
• Department of Government Efficiency website