D.C. Memo: Blair Levin: "There Is Only One Question: What Does Elon Want?"

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Elon: New Street Research Policy Advisor Blair Levin said Elon Musk has unprecedented sway over D.C. telecom policy, a Trump insider who can shape policy to directly benefit his satellite-delivered Internet service Starlink. Musk, he said, could use his influence to halt the $42.45 billion BEAD program and later get NTIA to shift funding from fiber to satellite. “In telecom, I think there is only one question: What does Elon want?" Levin said yesterday on a Jenner & Block Zoom call. Levin, FCC Chief of staff in the early 1990s, said the scope of Musk's influence, with its potential to yield large financial benefits personally, has never been seen before. "We have never been in a situation where we had somebody of that kind of influence having a company with that kind of potential for benefiting from policy," he said. Levin said it was logical for Musk to target BEAD. "From his perspective, the BEAD program is overbuilding his already established network." Musk has been telling Trump that satellite is better than fiber. "If that's what Trump believes, that is a massive change in government policy," Levin said. Putting Musk-friendly officials in charge of NTIA was a Musk priority, Levin said. "I have no idea who is going to be head of NTIA, but I just think Musk is very familiar with the powers of the NTIA and he would very much, for example, like a new head of NTIA put out a notice right away, saying 'We're stopping everything on BEAD and we're not going to do anything until we've figured this out and in addition getting rid of the preference for fiber.'" At the FCC, "Musk is going to be dominating the agenda," Levin said.