type: timeline_event Acting NASA Administrator Janet Petro confirmed in February 2025 that the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), led by Elon Musk, was planning to conduct a comprehensive review of NASA's spending and contracts. The announcement raised immediate concerns about conflicts of interest, as Musk's SpaceX had become NASA's largest private contractor, holding billions of dollars in launch contracts, the Commercial Crew Program, and the Artemis lunar lander program. The Huntsville Business Journal noted that DOGE's audit of NASA represented an extraordinary situation where a government official was positioned to review contracts that would be awarded to or from his own companies.
ABC News reported that while Musk worked to slash federal spending through DOGE, his own companies had received billions of dollars in federal contracts, predominantly from NASA and the Defense Department. SpaceX's contracts with NASA included the Crew Dragon transportation system for International Space Station missions, the Starship Human Landing System for Artemis lunar missions, and various launch services contracts. A DOGE review of NASA budgets could theoretically redirect funding in ways that would benefit or disadvantage SpaceX competitors, concentrating NASA business with Musk's company.
The DOGE audit of NASA fit within a broader pattern of Musk using DOGE access to federal agencies that regulated or contracted with his businesses. DOGE personnel had simultaneously targeted the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (which regulated Tesla), the Federal Aviation Administration (which regulated SpaceX launches), and other agencies with direct jurisdiction over Musk's corporate interests. Ethics experts and Democratic lawmakers argued that a private citizen with billions of dollars in federal contracts should not have authority to audit and restructure the agencies awarding those contracts, characterizing the arrangement as a textbook conflict of interest that would be illegal if Musk were a formal government employee subject to conflict-of-interest statutes.