• jballs@sh.itjust.worksOPEnglish
    69·
    4 months ago

    He’s planning on giving $180,000,000 before the election. That’s a lot of free speech.

  • Not_mikey@slrpnk.net
    33·
    4 months ago

    I’d think he’d be worried about trump removing ev subsidies, as he said he would multiple times, but Tesla stock seems so untied to reality that even if sales plunged the stock might increase as more of his braindead supporters would buy it to own the libs.

    • joekar1990@lemmy.worldEnglish
      10·
      4 months ago

      I don’t, in musk’s mind it’s probably buying a favor so Tesla is excluded from subsidies removal. They’d find another way to get Musk more federal funds by saying their only a tech company and working on AI or some shit like that.

    • glimse@lemmy.world
      2·
      4 months ago

      (only commenting because it changes the meaning of your point)

      I think you typoed “untied” and in your defense, my phone just autocorrected that to “United”

  • skuzz@discuss.tchncs.de
    15·
    4 months ago

    While campaign finance laws are dogshit these days, isn’t there some kind of upper limit on how much one can donate to a campaign?

    • oxjox@lemmy.mlEnglish
      12·
      4 months ago

      There are limits to what an individual can donate to a campaign and a PAC. There are no limits to donating to a Super PAC.

      https://www.fec.gov/help-candidates-and-committees/taking-receipts-pac/contribution-limits-nonconnected-pacs/
      https://www.fec.gov/help-candidates-and-committees/taking-receipts-pac/contributions-to-super-pacs-and-hybrid-pacs/

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_action_committee#Super_PACs

      Super PACs are unlike traditional PACs in that they may raise unlimited amounts from individuals, corporations, unions, and other groups to spend on, for example, ads overtly advocating for or against political candidates. However, they are not allowed to either coordinate with or contribute directly to candidate campaigns or political parties.

      • Upsidedownturtle@lemmy.world
        2·
        4 months ago

        One thing to note is pac money is less efficient than campaign money. Campaigns get the lowest rate for advertisements while pacs pay market rate. Super pacs technically can’t coordinate with campaigns so there isn’t a unified message, however the FEC is pretty toothless so any coordination would likely have to be very blatant for action to be taken. Their advertisements can also be overly biased by their ultra wealthy donors, ie something that musk cares about a lot may not have significant sway on the public which can cause said ad to be wasted.

    • SirDerpy@lemmy.world
      21·
      4 months ago

      The answer is similar to the answer of, “Do large corporations pay taxes?”

      Technically, large corporations pay taxes and there’s limits to how much an individual donates to a political campaign.

      But, if the individual uses financial constructs such as SPACS and C-Corporations, they can effectively donate as much as they wish, and even do so covertly.

      It’s like most anything else: The rules are constructed for and enforced inversely proportional to fiscal class.

      Small groups can make a substantial difference by using these tools for “good”. A fantastic example of an idea that scaled beautifully is Proton, a C-corp, soon to be majority owned by a trust with zero liabilities, soon forever subordinate to the principle of privacy in digital services.

  • vxx@lemmy.world
    6·
    4 months ago

    That’s a small price for getting Trumpists to boost Tesla stock price and become a couple billion richer.

  • smnwcj@fedia.io
    11·
    4 months ago

    He knows Trump will win, it’s a safe bet to win some favor.