Elon Musk Says He’s Moving X and SpaceX Headquarters to Texas

The tech entrepreneur mentioned state’s transgender laws that could represent “the final straw” for exile from the state.

By Paresh Dave

Jul 16, 2024 06:24 PM

HTML0 Elon Musk has announced that the move parts of his empire’s business operations to Texas. Musk’s company X and SpaceX will shift their office to The Lone Star State from California Musk wrote in a series of blog posts about X the day before. The CEO didn’t offer a timeline to move the headquarters, however he made it clear what his reason for the change.

“This is the final straw,” Musk declared in an article on the recent California law that shields those who identify as transgender from being targeted by kids. “Because of this law and the many others that preceded it, attacking both families and companies, SpaceX will now move its HQ from Hawthorne, California, to Starbase, Texas.” Musk said that “X HQ will move to Austin” from San Francisco and that he’s “had enough of battling groups of drug addicts who are violent to get into to and out. “

Relocations to headquarters could begin as a symbolic gesture however they can be very significant for states such as California when employees relocate due to their budgets relying on the taxation of highly-flying tech workers.

The laws of California have long sparked the ire from Musk. Musk said in 2020 that he’d moved to Texas in hopes of being able to get around California’s tax burdens. The following year, Tesla relocated its office from San Francisco to Austin out of Silicon Valley over frustrations about the pandemic restrictions in Austin which he claimed had a negative impact on the company’s operations. “Frankly, this is the final straw,” Musk tweets in the middle in his post. Musk’s tunnel-digging company Boring Company ditched California for Texas in 2022.

The newest law that has earned Musk’s ire was passed on Tuesday, by California Governor Gavin Newsom. The law prohibits schools from requiring staff to reveal the identity of the student’s gender, or sexual preference for gender without the consent of students. The law is in addition to the guidelines adopted by regional boards of education that obliged teachers to inform parents whenever their kids showed evidence of being transgender.

“I did make it clear to Governor Newsom about a year ago that laws of this nature would force families and companies to leave California to protect their children,” Musk wrote in blog posts posted on Tuesday.

Newsom has refused to provide the response to WIRED however his office clarified it was a requirement under California laws require parental approval in order to alter their personal names. The governor also stated that parents also have access to their school documents.

The question of parental rights is a the individual’s choice to Musk. The past the biography about Musk composed by Walter Isaacson disclosed Musk’s billionaire status. Musk blamed the school that he attended as his oldest child for introducing her to certain morals that led her to become female and exclude Musk from her world.

When Musk bought Twitter in the year 2022, the company allowed people to make use of transgender people who had previously used names, commonly called deadnames. As per some activist Musk has made it less necessary to monitor anti-LGBTQ content.

A spokesperson of GLAAD that promotes LGBT rights says it’s uncommon to see someone “with a long history of hateful rhetoric” make use of the new law’s provisions to spread controversial views. “The state of California’s support for transgender and nonbinary students does not harm students or parents, but creates a model for all leaders in education to ensure LGBTQ student safety and privacy,” The spokesperson, who requested anonymity to protect them from harassing.

X, SpaceX, and Newsom have not yet replied to requests for comments. Texas Governor Greg Abbott, in an article on X was thrilled by the move from SpaceX in Texas and into Texas.

Other Musk businesses are located situated in California. His OpenAI competitor xAI is located in its home, which is within his home in San Francisco Bay Area city of Burlingame. Brain implant company Neuralink is located across in the Bay within Fremont. Although Tesla has moved its headquarters to Texas, Musk has kept significant production operations in Fremont and has announced an engineering facility to the electric vehicle manufacturer located at Palo Alto.

The update was made on 7/16/24 at 7:48 PM ET This report was added with comments from GLAAD along with Gavin Newsom’s Office.