The U.S. planned to spend $40 billion to build reliable internet in rural America, then Elon Musk got a huge chunk of that money redirected to Starlink. Musk made hundreds of millions, while countless people still don’t have good internet access.
Video by John Gallen and Anthony Mascorro
TRANSCRIPT
JOHN GALLEN, MORE PERFECT UNION: There’s a town in Louisiana where people have been left behind. So the government threw them a lifeline.
PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN’S STATE OF THE UNION CLIP: We’re making sure that every community, every community in America has access to affordable high-speed internet.
BRIAN VO, CONNECT HUMANITY CEO: Right now there are anywhere from 20 to 30 million Americans with no internet at all.
LEATRICE HAWKINS, RESIDENT: I’m paying around $84 a month. You could be online and doing something — and all of a sudden [the internet] goes off.
GALLEN: In 2021, the Biden administration created a program to finally build high-speed internet in rural areas across the country.
NATHANIEL WILLS, DELTA INTERFAITH PREACHER: We announced this last December $6 million to finish it.
GALLEN: Then the Democrats lost.
JOE ROGAN CLIP: [The Democrats] didn’t get anybody. They could have gotten Starlinks to everybody…
TRUMP CLIP: … for almost nothing
GALLEN: And when Trump was reelected…
WILLS:… all the rules were rewritten. For the next round, we’re only awarded $150,000 for 204 Starlinks.
GALLEN: The new winner was Elon Musk’s Starlink.
HOWARD LUTNICK FOX NEWS CLIP: I mean, who wouldn’t invest in Elon Musk? You gotta be kidding me.
LINDA MILLIKIN, DELTA INTERFAITH ORGANIZER, TO GALLEN: You’re not gonna get fiber, but we’re gonna give you satellite. And to me, that’s secondary stuff.
NATHAN JOHNSON, TEXAS ATTORNEY GENERAL CANDIDATE: It is a government handout to Elon Musk, but worse than that, it’s a whole shift in the favor of a technology that he dominates.
GIGI SOHN, EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE AMERICAN ASSOCIATION FOR PUBLIC BROADBAND: When I see the richest man in the world profiting from government subsidy, it’s supremely ironic and frustrating. It’s a tale as old as time, right?
GALLEN: How did Elon Musk end up with taxpayer-funded money that was supposed to go toward providing fiber internet for the country’s poorest rural areas?
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I’m positevely sure it won’t “shock” me, no