The White House directed the Defense Department and NASA earlier this month to collect information on billions of dollars in SpaceX contracts after the public spat between President Donald Trump and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, according to a report.
The Trump administration ordered the agencies to scrutinize Musk’s contracts to prepare for possible retaliation against the billionaire tech executive and his companies, Reuters reported, citing people familiar with the matter.
Pentagon officials are simultaneously considering whether to reduce the role that SpaceX may secure in a new U.S. "Golden Dome" missile defense system.
It is unclear whether the White House plans to cancel any of SpaceX's roughly $22 billion in federal contracts. But the review shows the administration is making good on a threat by Trump during his spat with Musk last week to possibly terminate business and subsidies for Musk's companies.
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"We'll take a look at everything," Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on June 6.
A White House spokesperson dodged questions from Reuters about Musk's business, saying the administration "is committed to a rigorous review process for all bids and contracts."
A NASA spokesperson said the agency "will continue to work with our industry partners to ensure the president’s objectives in space are met."
People familiar with the order told Reuters that the contract scrutiny aims to give the administration the ability to act fast if Trump decides to punish Musk, who was the head of the Department of Government Efficiency and a senior advisor to the president before his recent departure from the federal government.
The review is "for political ammunition," one of the people told the outlet.
It remains to be seen whether the federal government could legally, or practically, cancel existing contracts. The possibility, however, sparked concerns among governance experts that politics and personal resentment could improperly influence matters impacting government money, national security and the public interest.
"There’s an irony here that Musk’s contracts could be under the same type of subjective political scrutiny that he and his DOGE team have put on thousands of other contracts," Scott Amey, a contracting expert and general counsel at the watchdog group Project on Government Oversight, told Reuters. "Any decision shouldn’t be based on the egos of two men but on the best interests of the public and national security."
In recent years, SpaceX has become a crucial partner of the U.S. government in much of its aerospace and defense work, including launching satellites and other space cargo and potentially managing a critical element of Trump's planned "Golden Dome" missile shield.
Musk in recent days has attempted to walk back some of his attacks against Trump, which had included calling for Trump’s impeachment and claiming the president was in the Justice Department's files on its investigation into accused pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.
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Both Musk and Trump have softened their stances against one another this week after trading attacks last week over Musk's criticism of the president for his "big beautiful" spending bill, following the billionaire tech executive spending months working to cut wasteful spending as part of DOGE.
Despite the feud, Musk's attacks against Trump put into the spotlight the federal government’s reliance on SpaceX.
Musk initially threatened to decommission the company’s Dragon spacecraft amid the rift with Trump before reversing course. The spacecraft, as part of a roughly $5 billion contract with NASA, is the only U.S. vessel currently capable of carrying astronauts to the International Space Station and back.
SpaceX is also building a network of hundreds of spy satellites under a classified contract with the U.S. intelligence agency, the National Reconnaissance Office, which deepened the company's ties with U.S. defense and intelligence services.
Reuters contributed to this report.
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