February 27, 2025
Elon Musk may be on the verge of securing a massive multibillion dollar contract with the federal government through the FAA. Yes – this is all happening even though his doge team is currently “plugged in” to the FAA systems and is also cutting the federal work force including more than 350 probationary employees at the FAA
And that is raising a lot of concerns – again – about Elon Musk’s potential conflicts of interest.
To explain what’s going on – I need to take you back to the end of January. To that midair collision in Washington DC between the passenger jet and that army helicopter that killed 67 people. One week later – the new transportation secretary Sean Duffy posted this to X – big news – talked to the DOGE team. They are going to plug in to help upgrade our aviation system. Now – before I get to the “plug in” part I need to make it very clear. It is a fact that the systems and infrastructure the FAA uses is old and clunky. It absolutely needs an upgrade. Some experts believe those upgrades are critical. No one disputes that. And the federal government has been in the process of revamping those systems for years. Upgrading a massive complicated system like this takes time.
Now — after secretary Duffy made that “plug in” announcement on February 5th Elon Musk posted to X that President Trump was fully in support of his DOGE team going into the FAA and making “rapid safety upgrades to the air traffic control system.” Turns out that DOGE team was actually from Musk’s company SpaceX. According to the secretary Duffy on February 16th, he said President Trump ordered him to “deliver a new, world class air traffic control system that will be the envy of the world.” And to do that he needs “advice from the brightest minds in America” he said the next day February 17th the space x team was going to tour the air traffic control system command center in Virginia to get ..a.. “first hand look at the current system, learn what air traffic controllers like and dislike about their current tools and envision how we can make a new, better, modern and safer system.” He said he is also asking for help from “any high-tech American developer or company willing to give back to our country.” Since then, there has been no announcement by the secretary of any other company taking similar tours of FAA’s command center.
Well fast forward to Monday of this week it was reported that musk sent thousands of his StarLink satellite terminals for deployment at FAA facilities. On Monday – the FAA put out this statement confirming that those StarLink terminals are –in fact — being tested at one facility in Atlantic City and two terminals are being tested at “non-safety critical sites in Alaska.”
The only issue with that is Verizon already secured a more than $2 billion contract with the FAA to do that work back in 2023.
Shortly after the FAA put out that statement about the StarLink terminals, Elon Musk took to his X platform and trashed Verizon saying “the Verizon system is not working and so it is putting air travelers at serious risk”. He doubled down this morning with this post saying Verizon’s communication system to air traffic control is breaking down very rapidly. The FAA assessment is single digit months to catastrophic failure putting air traveler safety at serious risk. The StarLink terminals are being sent at no cost to the tax payer on an emergency basis to restore air traffic control connectivity. The situation is extremely dire. Of course Musk’s StarLink system is considered world class and is particularly important for remote areas – but today – Verizon pushed back saying Elon Musk has no idea what he’s talking about.
Verizon isn’t responsible for the systems in place right now, you know the ones Musk says are on the verge of catastrophic failure. Verizon says another company is. L3Harris. Verizon won that multi-billion dollar FAA contract to fix those L3Harris systems. The company said today “our company is working on building the next generation system for the FAA which will support the agency’s mission for safe and secure air travel. We are at the beginning of a multiyear contract to replace antiquated, legacy systems. Our teams have been working with the FAA’s technology teams and our solution stands ready to be deployed. We continue to partner with the FAA on achieving its modernization objectives.” Verizon spokesperson Kevin Israel
Well – Musk ended up correcting himself later today – saying “correction. The ancient system that is rapidly declining in capability was made L3Harris. The new system that is not yet operational is from Verizon.
Just one more piece of information you should consider. Understanding that this whole situation would probably raise questions about potential conflicts of interest between Elon Musk and the Trump administration — in that statement on Monday, the FAA- said the department had “been considering the use of StarLink since the prior administration to increase reliability at remote sites.”
Look – we know the federal government – including the FAA is in the process of reviewing a wide range of federal contracts. This multi billion dollar contract with Verizon is one. There is no guarantee that the FAA will drop the contract with Verizon and there is no guarantee that even if they do drop it that Elon musk’s company SpaceX would win it. But it certainly raises questions. Especially becuase the law and Federal regulations prohibit government contractors from having any conflicts of interest and warn even against the mere appearance of a conflict of interest.
Obviously – we want the best air traffic control system and obviously as I reported, we know the current system needs to be upgraded, but how that gets done and who gets it done – I’ll let you decide that part.
