Musk Casts Doubt on Trump’s $100 Billion AI Announcement

Tech

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By The New York Times

Published 2 months ago on

January 22, 2025

President Donald Trump is joined by, from left, Masayoshi Son, chief executive of SoftBank, and Sam Altman, chief executive of OpenAI, at an event touting a $100 billion venture in artificial intelligence infrastructure, at the White House in Washington on Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2025. Openly questioning the administration he now serves, Elon Musk cast doubt on Trump’s announcement, saying that the so-called “Stargate” venture did not have the financing to achieve the promised investment levels. (Haiyun Jiang/The New York Times)

Elon Musk questions the financing of President Trump’s $100 billion Stargate AI venture, citing lack of funds.
Musk’s public skepticism marks a rare break with the administration he advises, challenging the president's AI claims.
OpenAI’s CEO refutes Musk’s criticism, inviting him to inspect the initial Stargate development site.

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WASHINGTON — Elon Musk is casting doubt on the first major tech investment announcement made by President Donald Trump, openly questioning the administration he now serves.

On Tuesday, Trump announced a joint venture among OpenAI, SoftBank and Oracle to create at least $100 billion in computing infrastructure to power artificial intelligence, some of which is already underway.

But in two late-night messages on his social platform X, Musk said the venture, dubbed Stargate, did not have the financing to achieve the promised investment levels.

“They don’t have the money,” Musk wrote in reply to an OpenAI post on the announcement. “SoftBank has well under $10B secured. I have that on good authority.”

Musk Makes Public Break With Trump’s Administration

The dismissal by Musk, who is one of Trump’s closest advisers and will head up an agency created to slash the nation’s budget, is one of his first public breaks with the administration. It’s also an unusual move for any senior policy official to question an initiative trumpeted by the president.

Trump claimed the AI announcement as an early trophy, taking credit for the companies’ decision to spend up to $500 billion building data centers, which are huge buildings full of servers that provide computing power. Trump promised to clear regulatory hurdles for the development of AI and to make the United States a global leader in the technology, beating out China.

Stargate already has $100 billion in hand, two people familiar with the venture said. SoftBank, OpenAI, Oracle and MGX, an investment group in the United Arab Emirates that focuses on AI, provided the financing.

Musk has been battling with OpenAI’s chief executive, Sam Altman. Musk, who helped found the company, has sued OpenAI and Altman for antitrust violations.

Altman took to X on Wednesday morning to refute Musk’s claims.

“Wrong, as you surely know,” Altman wrote. “Want to come visit the first site already under way?”

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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By Theodore Schleifer and Cecilia Kang/Haiyun Jiang
c. 2025 The New York Times Company