Elon Musk to Speak to West Point Cadets

Politics|Elon Musk to Speak to West Point Cadets

Elon Musk, the billionaire proprietor of the societal media level X and Tesla’s main executive, volition present the keynote code astatine the yearly convocation of the United States Military Academy adjacent Friday, West Point officials said.

The code is billed arsenic a “fireside chat,” and attendance for West Point cadets and module is not mandatory, officials said. The lawsuit volition beryllium portion of the world year’s intelligence theme, “The Human and the Machine: Leadership connected the Emerging Battlefield,” according to a connection provided by the academy.

“West Point routinely invites salient thought leaders successful areas related to the taxable to heighten our robust world and nonrecreational improvement opportunities,” the connection said.

Mr. Musk’s institution SpaceX handles motorboat services for spy and command-and-control satellites for the Pentagon and provides net work for Ukraine. It has received $14.7 cardinal successful national motorboat contracts implicit the past decade.

Last month, Mr. Musk broke with a signifier acceptable by the leaders of different large societal media firms by endorsing a statesmanlike candidate. Some 30 minutes aft Mr. Trump was changeable astatine a rally successful Pennsylvania, Mr. Musk announced that helium was backing his bid for the White House.

“I afloat endorse President Trump and anticipation for his accelerated recovery,” Mr. Musk wrote connected X, sharing a video of Mr. Trump. He aboriginal endorsed Mr. Trump’s prime of JD Vance arsenic a moving mate.

In caller years, Mr. Musk has been criticized for embracing conspiracy theories and for his strident positions successful taste debates.

The White House denounced him past twelvemonth for boosting an anti-Jewish conspiracy mentation connected X, calling his actions an “abhorrent promotion of antisemitic and racist hate.”

Mr. Musk has had adjacent associations with U.S. subject academies. In April 2022, helium visited the Air Force Academy and told throngs of cadets astatine a lecture that they should combat the discouragement that researchers encounter.

“Prototypes are easy; accumulation is hard,” helium said. “We retrieve mistakes much than successes.”

Mr. Musk attended the Army-Navy crippled successful December astatine Gillette Stadium adjacent Boston, tweeting a photograph of himself with the caption “God Bless America.”

Retired Maj. Gen. Paul D. Eaton, a West Point postgraduate and elder advisor to VoteVets, a progressive veterans advocacy group, criticized his alma mater’s move.

“Elon Musk is not a thought leader,” helium said. “He is acold from the illustration we should beryllium elevating astatine our subject academies. Why is West Point doing this?”

Mr. Musk could not beryllium reached for comment.