Donald Trump promised Tuesday to give special treatment to billionaires.
“Any person or company investing ONE BILLION DOLLARS, OR MORE, in the United States of America, will receive fully expedited approvals and permits, including, but in no way limited to, all Environmental approvals,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “GET READY TO ROCK!!!”
If this strangely broad offer sounds specially designed to delight billionaire and official presidential hanger-on Elon Musk, that’s probably because it is.
“This is awesome,” Musk replied in a post on X. Yeah dude, for you—and for any other government contractor or company that plans to fill the holes created by Musk and Trump’s plot to dissolve essential features of the federal government. Yeah, those guys stand to make a killing. How “awesome.”
It’s unclear what kinds of companies or individuals would be eligible for this offer, or what kinds of projects they would produce. It’s possible that Trump plans to implement this offer as part of “Drill, Baby, Drill!” his stupidly named plan to expand fossil fuel production and gut environmental protections.
For example, in return for a hefty investment from an energy company, Trump could revoke certain pollution controls that prevent corporations harvesting natural gas from contaminating groundwater supplies.
If this proposal is approved, the responsibility for executing his lofty promises and expediting production will fall to Lee Zeldin, the unqualified loyalist Trump has nominated to head the Environmental Protection Agency.
It’s also unclear whether this would affect existing programs incentivising investment, such as the much-beloved CHIPS Act, which created subsidies for semiconductor manufacturing in the United States. Trump recently called the CHIPS Act a “bad deal,” shortly before House Speaker Mike Johnson announced his intention to revoke it (though he later made a limp attempt to walk back that particular comment).
Crucially, it’s not apparent that Trump has the authority to make the offer in the first place—but he sure has done it before.
At a meeting at Mar-a-Lago in April, Trump promised oil executives and lobbyists that he would roll back crucial environmental regulations, in return for a small campaign contribution of $1 billion, according to The New York Times.
