SpaceX has contracts to do all types of labor for america authorities, from placing Toyotas on the moon to plunging the Worldwide House Station into the ocean. The corporate’s work contains secret tasks for the U.S. army, however CEO Elon Musk wouldn’t know a lot about that — he’s not allowed into these rooms at company HQ.
Entry to that type of categorised information requires safety clearance, and Musk does even have that: He’s held High Secret-level clearance since 2022. Particular tasks, nonetheless, can require extra addenda on prime of the generalized clearance. SpaceX’s attorneys, in line with a brand new report from the Wall Road Journal, have suggested towards Musk asking for these extra packages — for worry that he might lose even the clearance he has attributable to his unfastened lips, frequent conferences with overseas officers, and drug use:
The SpaceX legal professionals started analyzing the dangers of in search of a better safety clearance for Musk after the Journal reported in June of final yr about Musk’s use of ketamine, in line with one individual conversant in the evaluation. The legal professionals and executives concluded that if SpaceX sought a better safety clearance, it could danger Musk being turned down, or worse, dropping the top-secret clearance he already has.
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Musk’s present top-secret clearance offers him entry to some national-security secrets and techniques, however he lacks particular authorizations that the federal government requires of most SpaceX staff who work on categorised packages, in line with the folks conversant in the matter. These staff—greater than 400—have permissions for what is named “delicate compartmented data,” the federal government’s time period for need-to-know secrets and techniques about how intelligence is collected and the place it comes from, one of many folks mentioned. A smaller variety of SpaceX staff have entry to secrets and techniques the federal government deems much more delicate known as particular entry packages.
Musk’s top-secret clearance, with out these authorizations, doesn’t entitle him to entry sure details about SpaceX’s spy satellite tv for pc program, known as Starshield, which presents satellite tv for pc {hardware} and providers to national-security companies, the folks mentioned. He isn’t allowed to enter most SpaceX amenities the place categorised work is finished and mentioned, and he hardly ever is aware of categorised components of cargo that his rockets blast into house, akin to sensors and different {hardware} connected to spy satellites.
Musk’s firm launches all matter of kit into house for the U.S. authorities, and Musk isn’t allowed to know what most of it’s — a limitation not shared by the CEOs of Boeing and Lockheed Martin, who the Journal states each have higher-level “delicate compartmented data” entry.
After all, The Journal presents this might all change on a dime when Donald Trump enters the white home subsequent month, by way of the proposed Division of Authorities Effectivity, however there’s no assure that it’ll. Musk has reportedly not precisely gotten together with the Trump camp, together with his behavior of enjoying up his personal significance apparently grating on the nerves of Trump’s group. Trump himself has even advised audiences he “can’t eliminate” Musk, irrespective of how a lot he tries.
The cringily-named DOGE would be the regulatory equal of handing your youthful cousin an unplugged Ps controller so that they really feel like they’re enjoying — as a physique not created by Congress, its powers are restricted to advising the manager department on choices to make. It’s fully doable that it exists to make its members really feel essential whereas protecting them away from something they will actually break (or annoy). In that case, extra safety clearances might not include the territory.
The truth that Musk can’t know what goes to house on his personal rockets is sweet enjoyable, however one has to marvel how a lot he’d actually danger by asking for additional safety clearances. In spite of everything, NASA has a proud historical past of counting on the brains of parents similar to Musk.
