How Silicon Valley’s influence in Washington benefits the tech elite

Summary

Elon Musk isn’t the only tech billionaire with power over the federal agencies that regulate his businesses. Since Donald Trump took office, more than three dozen employees, allies, and investors of Musk, Peter Thiel, Marc Andreessen, and Palmer Luckey have taken roles at federal agencies, helping direct billions in contracts to their companies. Companies owned, founded, or invested in by Musk, Thiel, Andreessen, and Luckey have collected more than a dozen federal contracts totaling about $6 billion since Trump’s inauguration in January, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis. And they’re actively pursuing billions more. Those appointments, which are in departments that oversee, regulate, and award business to the four men’s companies, raise a number of red flags. They could violate conflict-of-interest laws or government ethics regulations, both of which prohibit federal employees from using public office for private gain. And while it’s not unusual to install trusted allies in government roles, Musk’s network has moved in at an unprecedented rate and scale. TechCrunch has previously reported on all of the people in Musk’s universe who have joined him at DOGE, where he has shuttered federal agencies and slashed workforces in departments that regulate his businesses. At least 19 others with Silicon Valley connections, be they founders or investors, have also joined DOGE. “The second Trump administration is actually the first in recent years to not impose any sort of additional ethics safeguards on high-level appointees,” Daniel Weiner, director of the Brennan Center’s Elections and Government Program, told TechCrunch. He noted that Trump fired at least 17 people at the Office of Government Ethics, including the director, immediately after taking office. “It certainly does potentially increase the risk that you have people working on matters that do impact, at least indirectly, their bottom lines,” Weiner said. “But this is a long-term issue in our government th...