Elon Musk left California in 2020 enraged at its Democratic leadership, uprooting his businesses and vowing to build his future in Texas. He led a group of entrepreneurs who fled to the conservative state seeking more favorable treatment and less intervention.
Now, their red-state refuge has turned blue, too.
The political upheaval has upended Musk’s standing in the state. Texas voters swept Democrats into its highest offices, putting Musk on a collision course with a new governor and attorney general who have made taking him on a facet of their campaigns. With sweeping victories that put them in position to wield power in the state, they are poised to make good on those promises.
Nathan Johnson, the incoming attorney general, vowed during his campaign to scrutinize matters such as satellite internet provider Starlink’s share of state broadband awards, as part of an “AntiMusk” plan on his campaign website.
In an interview, Johnson told The Washington Post he intends to follow through on his pledge to investigate.
“I’m not going to be strong-armed by Elon Musk saying, ‘Gosh, I created all these jobs for you,’” he said. “If you want to play somewhere else and corner markets, … abuse workers and do all sorts of bad things, get out.”
Incoming governor Gina Hinojosa has also signaled skepticism of the state’s business relationship with Musk and SpaceX. And incoming senator James Talarico (D) overcame more than $150 million in Musk spending to defeat the billionaire’s preferred candidate, outgoing attorney general Ken Paxton (R).
For Musk, whose vast presence in Texas includes Tesla’s Austin Gigafactory, SpaceX facilities on the Gulf Coast, and a planned chip factory in the southeastern part of the state, the consequences of the Democratic wave could be transformative.
Musk didn’t take kindly to California officials’ meddling in his business matters in 2020 — or one state official’s profane broadside against him on X, then Twitter — culminating in his move.
It’s a far cry from the business climate Musk entered when he moved to the Lone Star State, along with a cohort of tech elites who were disillusioned by California and its restrictive regulatory environment, perceived hostility and the prolonged covid shutdowns of 2020. Texas was their refuge.
Following the election, many of this cohort are asking if they are still welcome in the state. Some leaders outside of the state are now courting Musk.
Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) urged Musk to move his businesses to his state, in response to an X post that posed the question: “How long before Elon moves Tesla, SpaceX, Boring, Neuralink from Texas to Florida?”
But even as some Democrats campaigned on challenging Musk, they have left the door open to working with him.
“We have to have balance,” Hinojosa said in a CNN interview, standing by a campaign position opposing the sale of a beach near a SpaceX facility to the rocket maker. “Selling our beach to Elon Musk is just something that is almost unimaginable. It’s unacceptable.”
Hinojosa did not rule out working with Musk, however.
“We can have a strong working relationship with Elon Musk and his companies, but it has to be on our terms. It cannot be just running over the people of Texas,” she said. “And that’s what changes now that I will be governor.”
Though Hinojosa has vowed to pause data center building in the state until the legislature could meet to enshrine “real protections,” she said in an interview that facilities that are already permitted would be able to proceed. “Interesting,” Musk wrote in reply to a tweet citing that position.
Talarico, whom Musk fiercely and at times falsely attacked, expressed admiration for the entrepreneur in the run-up to the election, even as he decried Musk and fellow megadonors as “Goliath” upon winning office.
“I’m a big fan of SpaceX. I’m a big fan of Tesla. [Musk] is a great business leader and entrepreneur and innovator. And I want him to stick to those things,” Talarico said in an interview with NBC News before the election.
“Nice of him to say that,” Musk wrote Thursday in response to the clip.
Clayton Swope, a senior fellow at the Center for Strategic and International Studies who is deputy director of the Aerospace Security Project, said Texas would not want to drive Musk out of the state.
“It’s a lot of high-tech jobs,” he said. “I don’t know how much a blue government in Texas would want to jeopardize that.”
Still, he said, Musk and SpaceX should expect “some level of scrutiny” in areas potentially including the environment, permitting or land use.
Ross Gerber, a SpaceX investor who once supported Musk but has emerged as a strong critic in recent years, said the billionaire should have predicted that the political pendulum would swing in the other direction.
“He made his bed,” Gerber said. “The hubris that he had, that he could just do whatever because he’s Trump’s right-hand person. Now all of a sudden, now ‘I’m going to have to answer for everything I’ve done.’”
In comments after winning, Hinojosa said her victory reflected a broader backlash against the tech elite — many of whom had made Texas their home.
“What this is about is about 99.9 percent of us in the same boat against like 15 billionaire tech guys who are frankly controlling government,” Hinojosa told CNN. “And that’s what the people voted against in this election. The people gave us a mandate for change.”
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