Trump announces billionaires will be exempt from normal environmental rules, Musk gloats

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is dancing for joy after his new father, Donald Trump, promised him that he would no longer have to abide by the pesky environmental rules that apply to lower class civilians.

President-elect Donald Trump announced in a Truth Social post on Tuesday that any “individual or company” investing $1 billion or more in the United States will “receive full and expedited approvals and permits, including but not limited to all environmental projects.” [sic] approve.

“Get ready to rock!!!” Trump exclaimed.

“This is awesome,” Musk, the world’s richest man, gloated on Twitter (formerly X), which he also owns.

The unusual announcement makes it sound as if the United States will soon introduce two sets of environmental rules: one for the wealthy and one for everyone else.

The initiative — always an issue for Trump if it happens — could also be in line with his claims. roll hard Support environmental protection and pave the way for fossil fuel production.

Trump’s choice for energy secretary, Chris Wright, is a climate change skeptic, which means we should be focusing more on oil and gas production.

Meanwhile, the president-elect called on America to “drill, baby, drill” while calling the environmental initiative known as the “Green New Deal” a “new green scam” and a “waste” of money.

For his part, Musk has become increasingly blind to protecting the environment as his public politics have shifted.

The billionaire previously vowed in his 2006 “secret masterplan” to “accelerate the transition from an economy of extracting and burning hydrocarbons to an economy of solar electricity, which I believe is the main, but not the only, sustainable solution.” Plan” manifesto – which was quietly removed from the electric car maker’s website earlier this year.

Once hailed as a pioneer in electrifying cars to save humanity from climate change, Musk has become a poster child for flouting environmental rules. Just last month, wall street journal It was discovered that Tesla’s factory in Austin had been leaking hazardous wastewater into the city’s sewers, violating local environmental guidelines.

SpaceX’s “Starbase” operation in southern Texas has also repeatedly violated environmental rules. Its thunderous Starship rocket launches threaten nearby nature reserves, including the wildlife living there.

The aerospace company was sued in October for discharging wastewater without a permit.

Not to mention that many researchers believe SpaceX’s thousands of Starlink satellites will release chemicals in Earth’s upper atmosphere as they burn up at the end of their useful lives, an environmental stress that scientists are only beginning to understand.

Musk also criticized the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration, and SpaceX sued the regulator for “regulatory overreach.”

In a larger sense, Trump also spoke out about the silent parts, declaring that only billion-dollar companies would be allowed to flout environmental rules, leaving everyone else out in the cold.

In other words, the world’s richest people are gaining more power—at a cost to the American people who will suffer the consequences.

“What about us small business owners?” one X user replied to Musk.

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