US midterms: Elon Musk fails $440 million bet as Republicans lose

Never before in modern American history did a single donor spend so much money in an election cycle. Elon Musk is estimated to have poured nearly half a billion dollars out of his pocket to support the Republican Party in midterms, far more than the 290 million he spent to help Donald Trump return to the White House. More than $200 million went towards Ken Paxton's Senate campaign in Texas, but the money wasn't enough to stop the seat from going to a Democrat for the first time in 38 years. We just sent a message to every billionaire megadonor, every trillionaire megadonor, power belongs to the people. The state is also set to have a Democratic governor who promised to crack down on data centers. Elon Musk moved his residence and companies from California to Texas during COVID, where he found a more favorable business environment. But projects such as a $100 billion Teraflop chip plant and a potential merger of SpaceX and Tesla could now face greater scrutiny. In the early days of Trump's second term, Musk aligned his company's interests with the administration's and was heavily involved in politics, leading the now-dissolved government cost-cutting agency DOGE. The new Democrat-controlled Congress is expected to increase oversight of big tech and billionaires. In a social media post, Senator Edward Markey said they're going to need to plant new forests for all the subpoenas we'll be printing. Musk, meanwhile, joked about the voter backlash, saying his election-interfering space lasers had failed.