Elon Musk Spent At Least $132 Million To Elect Donald Trump, Allies

Elon Musk gave another $56 million to elect Donald Trump and other Republicans in the final weeks of the 2024 election, bringing to at least $132 million the amount spent by the world's richest person to elevate his allies to the White House and Congress, federal filings show.

The donations - revealed in disclosures with the Federal Election Commission Thursday - show that the Tesla Inc. and SpaceX chief executive officer has poured money into the Washington trifecta: funding Trump's White House bid, along with supporting House and Senate Republicans.

Musk, who had only given modest political donations until the 2024 election cycle, funneled $43.6 million in the first half of October into America PAC, the group he founded, bringing his total for the year to $118.6 million. He also spent millions more spreading money around the political system which helps him build a network of allies.

The filings show donations through Oct. 16 and are the final detailed look at federal campaigns' and super political action committees' finances before Election Day on Nov. 5.

Musk's super PAC is paying for operations to boost voter turnout for Trump in battleground states and Republicans in swing districts that could help the GOP win a House majority. America PAC is also spending on digital ad campaigns, some of which target young men, trying to get them to the polls to offset Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris' advantage among women voters.

Musk's giving to other groups included $10 million to the Senate Leadership Fund, a super PAC that aims to elect Senate Republicans, and $2.3 million to the Sentinel Action Fund, a super PAC doing get-out-the-vote work for Republican Senate campaigns in Montana, Nevada, Ohio and Pennsylvania. 

The donations are the latest demonstration of how Musk, whose companies boast billions of dollars worth of federal contracts and who has personally bristled at government regulations, is expanding his political influence network to include a potential future president and members of Congress.

His political activities have received some scrutiny from federal officials. The US Justice Department sent a letter to his super PAC this week warning that a program to give $1 million a day to registered voters in swing states who sign an online petition may violate federal laws. It's illegal to pay individuals to vote or to register to vote. 

In addition to Musk, eight other individuals also donated to America PAC, including investor Nelson Peltz and members of the DeVos family, who are longtime Republican donors. Betsy DeVos was Trump's education secretary.

America PAC spent $47 million and had $3.3 million cash on hand heading into the last 19 days before Election Day. Since its launch earlier this year through Oct. 16, America PAC has spent $105 million backing Trump.

Musk is playing an unprecedented role in the 2024 campaign for a political donor. In addition to his donations, he's appeared on stage with Trump and held his own campaign rallies without the former president. At an event earlier this month in Pennsylvania, Musk used ominous rhetoric, telling the crowd that "this election is going to decide the fate of America. And along with the fate of America, the fate of western civilization."

The former president has said he would ask Musk to join his administration should he win a second term, heading up an effort to cut government waste nicknamed the Department of Government Efficiency, or DOGE, a reference to a cryptocurrency Musk has embraced.

Deep-pocketed donors are playing a critical role in supporting Trump, who lags far behind Harris in fundraising. She's been outspending his campaign in all seven of the battleground states that will decide the election in the final stretch since Labor Day, according to data from AdImpact. Her media buys total $352 million compared to $214 million for Trump.

Harris' financial advantage has also allowed her to open more then 330 field offices staffed with more than 2,000 paid employees to help conduct its voter-mobilization operations. But the candidates are statistically tied among likely voters in each of the seven swing states in the Bloomberg News/Morning Consult poll, with the razor-thin margins in these battlegrounds underscoring how the final blitz of advertising, rallies and door-knocking campaigns could decide who claims the White House.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)