On Thursday, March 13, the Campaign Legal Center (CLC) filed a complaint with the U.S. Department of Transportation’s acting Inspector General. The complaint asks them to investigate if Elon Musk unlawfully influenced government decision-making and Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) contracts involving his satellite business.
CLC is a nonpartisan legal organization dedicated to solving the challenges facing American democracy. Its mission is to fight for every American’s freedom to vote and participate meaningfully in the democratic process, particularly Americans who have faced political barriers because of race, ethnicity, or economic status.
CLC’s Kedric Payne said the following about the ethics complaint: “ The American people deserve an unimpeded investigation to determine whether Elon Musk has violated conflict of interest laws by prioritizing his own personal financial interests over the public good,” said Kedric Payne, vice president, general counsel and senior director for ethics at Campaign Legal Center. “Based on his public statements, it appears that Musk has corrupted decision-making at the FAA involving the agency's use of his satellite internet business. Corruption happens when government officials abuse their powerful positions for personal gain — Elon Musk owes it to the American public to remove himself from overseeing policy decisions connected to his personal profits.”
The complaint states the following: Campaign Legal Center writes to request that the Office of the Inspector General (“OIG”) investigate whether the Federal Aviation Administration’s (“FAA”) business transactions with Elon Musk’s satellite internet company are improper due to violations of the criminal conflict of interest law, 18 U.S.C. § 208. Specifically, public reports establish that the FAA began using Starlink services and considering contracts with the company in response to Musk’s requests, who is a special government employee (“SGE”) and the CEO of Starlink. Multiple FAA officials, including the Department of Transportation Secretary and one of the Department’s lead engineers, publicly stated that Musk is the source of the directives for the FAA to implement Starlink technology. If Musk participated in or directed discussions with FAA employees concerning business transactions with Starlink, he may have violated the criminal conflict of interest law and corrupted FAA’s business relationship with Starlink.
For over 60 years, federal law has banned executive branch employees, including SGEs, from participating in business transactions where they may receive a financial benefit. Courts have found that this law is intended to protect public trust in government because when an executive branch employee profits from a government contract, the contract is tainted, and it diminishes confidence in government.4 OIG is responsible for investigating ethics issues connected to FAA’s business partners, and its stated priorities include “fraud schemes that significantly impact DOT funds [and] employee integrity violations.
Accordingly, the evidence suggesting that Musk has blatantly and improperly influenced the FAA’s decision to work with Starlink warrants a thorough OIG fact-finding. The public has a right to know that their tax dollars are being spent in the public’s best interest and not to benefit a government employee’s financial interests. OIG should investigate the FAA’s recent decision to use Starlink and Musk’s conduct to determine whether a criminal violation occurred.
Federal Criminal Law Prohibits Special Government Employees from Influencing an Agency’s Business Transactions Involving their Financial Interests
Pursuant to the federal criminal conflicts of interest law, “an officer or employee of the executive branch of the United States Government . . . including a special Government employee,” shall not participate “personally and substantially as a Government officer or employee, through decision, approval, disapproval, recommendation, the rendering of advice, investigation, or otherwise, in a . . . contract . . . or other particular matter in which, to his knowledge, he . . . has a financial interest.
The full complaint with citations can be viewed by clicking HERE.
A golden tray sits on the Resolute Desk as President Donald Trump speaks during an announcement on American nuclear innovation in the Oval Office at the White House on July 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C. Trump is signing multiple executive orders targeting the nuclear energy sector and easing rules for new reactors and nuclear fuel supply chains.
Trump’s hubris rivals the fallen heroes of ancient Greek mythology
In January, the New York Times asked President Donald Trump if there were any limits on his global powers.
“Yeah,” the president responded, “there is one thing. My own morality. My own mind. It’s the only thing that can stop me.”
That was eight months ago, but fortunately Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” has made ancient Greek literature newly relevant. Before that window closes, I’d like to talk about hubris.
Today, the term mostly means excessive pride or arrogance. That’s part of what the Greeks meant by it too, but the meaning was a bit richer and more specific. Hubris was an insolent or outrageous act that offended the gods, often because the transgressor was claiming abilities or authorities that solely belonged to supreme beings.
Nolan renamed and slightly modified the concept of xenia for the film, calling it “Zeus’ law.” In the director’s telling, mortals should follow the rules laid out by the gods, specifically the requirement to treat strangers with respect lest they be gods in disguise.
In a sense, hubris is the opposite, or at least the rejection, of xenia. The hubris of the suitors, and at times Odysseus himself, invites punishment by the gods and their mortal instruments.
Which brings me back to Donald Trump. His claim that there are no constraints on his personal power to dictate events on the global stage was one of the greatest expressions of hubris ever uttered by a political leader.
Trump’s claim was obviously false when he made it.
He vowed that he could end the Russia-Ukraine war in 24 hours. He’s proved powerless to make that happen. If he had divine powers to work his will, why would he have balked at implementing his tariffs so often that Wall Street adopted the “TACO trade” term for his deals? “TACO” stands for “Trump always chickens out.”
And why would Trump have made so many embarrassing concessions to China — from rescinding tariffs on Chinese goods to allowing them to buy crucial and incredibly valuable computer chips?
But Trump saw his success at capturing Venezuelan strongman Nicolas Maduro as proof of his ability to launch missiles to the same effect as Zeus’ lightning bolts. Trump believed he was the most powerful man who ever lived.
This is no exaggeration. In March, when the Iran invasion seemed successful, Trump gave a document penned by“Presidential Historian David King” to New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan purporting to prove that Trump was “the most powerful person to have EVER walked this planet.” King was, in fact, a businessman and occasional caddy for legendary golfer Gary Player.
King compared Trump favorably to many of history’s most powerful, and often heinous, figures: Alexander the Great, Attila the Hun, William the Conqueror, Napoleon Bonaparte, Joseph Stalin, Genghis Khan, Mao Tse Tung, Adolf Hitler and Vladimir Lenin. Many of these men thought they were the most powerful person in the world, too. And many were defeated precisely because they believed it.
At least Napoleon and Hitler had a string of truly impressive victories before they learned the folly of hubris. The limits on Trump’s power have been exposed by far less august forces than the combined might of the allies in World War II or the fearsome Russian winter.
Iran is a comparatively middling power. But the regime’s ability to absorb punishment while imposing its will on the Strait of Hormuz has proved to be a greater constraint on Trump’s power than his morality or mind. We should note that, at least rhetorically, his morality has not proved much of a constraint. He has repeatedly promised to destroy Iranian “civilization” if the regime refuses to capitulate.
But they haven’t — and won’t anytime soon — because the regime’s tolerance for pain far outstrips Trump’s. The combined fear of skyrocketing oil prices, outrage of Gulf state potentates, diminishing weapon supplies and domestic unpopularity is doing the work that international law, congressional oversight and the collective opinion of foreign policy experts can’t or won’t do.
If I considered Trump more heroic than reason and facts could allow, I would say his Sisyphean predicament has the whiff of Greek tragedy to it. Trump is vexed by the fact that the Iranians won’t honor deals or ratify his countless premature claims of victory — giving new meaning to his vow that his presidency would make people tired of winning. It’s almost like they’re out-Trumping Trump.
Things might have gone better if he’d heeded that great Greek tragedian Sophocles: “For Zeus utterly abhors the boasts of a proud tongue.”
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Jonah Goldberg is editor-in-chief of The Dispatch and the host of The Remnant podcast. His Twitter handle is @JonahDispatch.