The United States government has not granted Tesla a contract to produce “armored electric cars,” said a state department spokesman on Thursday, clarifying a budget document that seemed to detail the agency’s plan to spend $ 400 million in vehicles in vehicles of Elon Musk’s automotive giant.
The spokesman told MSNBC that the Biden administration asked the State Department to “explore the interest of private companies to produce electric vehicles.” In response to that application last year, the agency made a request for information to “request interest.”
The department received interest from a single company at that time and, as a “next step in that process”, an official application would have been sent to vehicle manufacturers to offer, said the spokesman. “However,” added the spokesman, “the application is waiting and there are no current plans to issue it.”
The spokesman clarified the matter one day after the Independent Drow Site News publication reported on the budget document, triggering a wave of speculation and scrutiny about Musk’s entanglement with a government in which he currently serves as one of the key advisors of the key advisors of the President Donald Trump.
The budget document cited in several news reports was an acquisition forecast by 2025, essentially a list of possible purchases. The spreadsheet input, labeled as “armored tesla (production units)” ” It did not specify the Tesla car model, which does not manufacture a “armored” vehicle.
Then, hours after the articles were published, the State Department seemed to eliminate the word “tesla” of the spreadsheet and loaded a revised version to the website of the agency, although a version of the list, including Tesla, still I was online on another website of the State Department until Thursday afternoon.
Musk, executive director of Tesla, threw cold water on the subject. “I am quite sure that Tesla does not get $ 400 million. No one mentioned it, at least, ”he wrote at 1 at 1:30 am et on Thursday.
Tesla and Musk did not immediately respond to the emails in search of comments on the matter on Thursday.
News reports attracted broad interest in part due to Musk’s power and influence on Trump administration. It directs the government efficiency department, a radical effort to drastically reduce government spending and reduce federal workforce. He has accused the federal government of generalized corruption and wasteful expenses.
Musk is also one of the most significant contractors of the federal and high profile government. In recent years, Musk’s Spacex firm has received billions of dollars in contracts. Silicon Valley’s tycoon has faced increasing questions about possible conflicts of interest given its simultaneous role in the Trump administration and its vast commercial participations.
The budget spreadsheet listed the possible allocations to other vehicle manufacturers, but the state department spokesman said the contracts have not “awarded to Tesla or any other vehicle manufacturer to produce armored electric vehicles for the department of State”.
