Just two days before launching an effort to cut red tape related to commercial space transportation, President Donald Trump last month purchased up to $5 million in bonds issued by SpaceX, a major federal contractor led by Elon Musk, according to ethics filings made public Thursday.
The SpaceX bond purchase was among 517 transactions Trump made in August, deals that highlight conflict of interest issues looming over his presidency.
Beyond SpaceX debt, Trump purchased up to $25 million of Meta stock, up to $6 million of Microsoft stock and a smaller amount of Oracle stock, according to filings.
These exchanges took place weeks before Trump summoned Musk, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg, and other AI executives for a summit at the White House. Notably, Trump has forcefully pushed back against calls for a regulatory crackdown to address security fears, opting instead for a lighter touch.
“There’s a conflict of interest. I’m not saying he’s doing something illegal, but it definitely gives the appearance of corruption,” Richard Painter, President George W. Bush’s top ethics lawyer, told CNN on Thursday.
Painter, now a professor at the University of Minnesota Law School, emphasized that the president, vice president and members of Congress are not subject to federal conflict of interest laws.
The White House insists that Trump was not personally involved in the latest wave of trades.
“President Trump’s stock and bond portfolio is independently managed by third-party financial institutions,” White House spokesperson Davis Ingle said in a statement to CNN. “All holdings are held in discretionary accounts and invested through computerized model portfolios that automatically track recognized indexes, such as the Schwab 1000.”
Ingle added that neither Trump nor “any member of his family has the ability to direct, influence or provide input on how the portfolio is invested or when investments are bought or sold.”
“All investment decisions are made entirely by independent managers. There are no conflicts of interest,” the White House spokesperson said.
However, the timing of the large-scale purchases of Meta and SpaceX stocks is worth noting.
The documents indicate that on August 18, Trump purchased between $1,000,001 and $5 million in senior unsecured SpaceX bonds due July 2031, paying an interest rate of 5.35%.
Two days later, the White House announced that Trump had signed a presidential national security memorandum aimed at accelerating the “golden age” of American space transportation.
SpaceX stands to gain from the new policy, which aims to allow more than 1,000 launches and reentries on U.S. soil per year by 2030, in part by speeding up permitting and environmental reviews.
Asked how he would have advised Bush to make a similar purchase of securities in a federal contractor, Painter replied: “No way. Don’t buy the bonds. Don’t do that.”
Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren told CNN in a statement: “Rather than lowering the price of gas and groceries, President Trump is using his office to enrich himself. This is corruption, plain and simple.”
“It is long past time for Congress to act and ban stock ownership and business transactions by members of Congress and the president,” Warren said.
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