Musk’s unprecedented role in US President Donald Trump’s administration, as overseer of government spending, has raised recurring questions about how he might police himself when one of his companies competes for official contracts. He has argued that all activities by his Department of Government Efficiency would be handled with transparency.
Tesla’s name had appeared in the document near that of BMW AG, whose armored X5 and X7 SUVs the State Department is also planning to buy. The German company’s name remains on the list, while Tesla’s has been excised, leaving the $400 million contract — still at the planning stage — now listed for a generic designation of “armored electric vehicles.”Representatives for the State Department, Tesla and Musk didn’t respond to requests for comment after regular business hours.
Sensitivity around potential conflicts of interest with Musk’s overlapping empire of six companies is likely to continue. His SpaceX, which launches rockets for the US military and ferries astronauts to and from the International Space Station for NASA, has already been awarded billions of dollars in contracts.
A large government order, in this case most likely for Tesla’s Cybertruck, would be a significant boost. The Cybertruck is built at Tesla’s factory in Austin, Texas and costs $79,990 before any tax incentives. Musk is a huge fan of military history and spoke at the US Military Academy at West Point, New York in August. Though some people imagine that the Cybertruck might one day roam the surface of Mars, Musk has regularly hinted at its military applications.
“I just wanted to make a futuristic battle tank, something that looked like it came out of Blade Runner or Aliens or something like that,” Musk said in an Automotive News podcast in 2020.
