As the post-election dust begins to settle, one person has remained a prominent presence in President-elect Donald Trump’s orbit. Apparently Elon Musk was very involved in Trump’s cabinet he chose and was chosen to lead a new advisory group called “Department for Government Efficiency” along with former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy.

Musk spent the least 132 million dollars to secure the White House and Congress for the Republicans. While his satellite internet company Starlink represents a fraction of his empire, which includes Tesla, SpaceX and X, analysts say it’s an “amazing” profitable fraction..

Several broadband policy experts told me that a second Trump administration could be more favorable to Starlink in several ways, including receiving federal funds and opening up new wireless spectrum.

Another industry source told me he believes Musk’s support for Trump is more about his SpaceX space business than Starlink from a government subsidy perspective — SpaceX is a key contractor for NASA and the Defense Department. Whichever business it prioritizes, it’s a safe bet that the winds will start to blow at Starlink’s back once Trump is back in office.

Starlink could get federal broadband funding for rural areas

Musk has had a rocky history with broadband policymakers so far, calling the Federal Communications Commission “despicable” on some days and “fair and sensible” on others. What is undeniable is that Starlink has been a boon for many rural residents with few options for high-speed internet.

“Starlink is really a game changer for us rural people,” said a Starlink user. sub-Reddit. “After suffering 15 years with dial-up and Viasat, it was a godsend.”

Even though it had an immediate impact in rural areas, Starlink was largely excluded $90 billion feeding frenzy for broadband money in the wake of the pandemic. Last year, the FCC rejected Starlink’s request for nearly $900 million in the Rural Digital Opportunity Fund, and Starlink was largely excluded from the $42.5 billion Broadband Capital, Access and Deployment Program — except for a kind of “internet of last resort” especially in hard-to-reach areas.

All this made Musk feel quite bitter. In June, he exploded beads as “an outrageous waste of taxpayers’ money” and “total failure to serve people in need”. BEAD prioritized expanding fiber networks to rural areas over LEOs like Starlink.

“Fiber can be anywhere from $10,000 to $30,000 a mile. I can bridge that gap with a $500 Starlink kit,” SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell said in August.

That might actually be an understatement. A often cited study from the Fiber Broadband Association found that typical fiber construction costs range from $6.49 to $16.25 per foot, or about $34,000 to $86,000 per mile.

“We want to serve as many people as possible in Wyoming with fiber,” Elaina Zempel, former broadband manager for the Wyoming Business Council, said in a recent interview. “But we have six people to the square mile and we have a lot of mountain passes. We’re talking about driving an 80-mile road and having one customer.”

While Starlink might sound like the obvious solution in areas like this, a few red flags give experts pause. First, Starlink has not proven that it has the capacity to connect millions of additional households.

“Starlink may fairly claim to cover a wide area, but spectrum constraints mean Starlink cannot serve all locations in that area,” wrote Blair Levin, former FCC chief of staff and telecommunications industry analyst at New Street Research . One recent note to investors.

Starlink does not connect people from FCC definition of broadbandeither — 100 Mbps download and 20 Mbps upload. The the latest data from Ookla — although a year old — shows Starlink users getting 65/10Mbps on average. (Disclosure: Ookla is owned by the same parent company as CNET, Ziff Davis.)

“Are we going to allow these extremely high cost areas to be stuck with Starlink while others gradually roll out fiber through BEAD funding?” Christopher Ali, a professor of telecommunications at Penn State University, told CNET. “It’s good enough today, but it won’t be good enough tomorrow, right? We’re not sure how well Starlink can scale.”

So far, agencies have taken this position when doling out BEAD funding: fiber first, Starlink (and other LEOs) as a last resort. But that could change with Trump’s victory.

“There is a real possibility that Elon Musk could persuade him to change the rules of the program to favor broadband satellite connections, most of which would be purchased from Musk’s SpaceX, which has a virtual monopoly,” said Michael Calabrese , director of the Wireless Future Project. at New America’s Open Technology Institute, CNET said before the election.

Musk could have a say in the FCC’s decisions

Musk eliminated Starlink’s speed and capacity issues, saying in October those “small but significant upgrades” will bring Starlink to speeds of 1,000 Mbps — if it can only get FCC approval. But that could change now that Republicans control the White House, which appoints the FCC chairman.

Experts say Musk’s influence will be felt in the election of a new FCC chair, with Republican Commissioner Brendan Carr as the presumptive choice. “Carr is Trump’s favorite, but he’s not certain to win,” Levin said. “What is certain is that Musk will have veto power over the selection.”

In Project 2025, a collection of conservative policy goals for the next administration, criticized Carr (PDF) wasteful broadband policies and supported Starlink, arguing that “the FCC should accelerate its work to support this new technology by moving faster in reviewing and approving applications to launch new satellites.” (For his part, Trump said about Project 2025 at the September debate“I haven’t read it. I don’t want to read it.”

“Carr has been very vocal about his disagreement with the FCC’s treatment of Starlink, especially when they denied RDOF funds,” Joel Thayer, president of the Digital Progress Institute, told CNET. “Whether Elon Musk praises it or not, Republicans have always been a little more open to this technology-neutral approach.”

Musk could exert his influence on broadband policy in several ways. The FCC controls how companies like Starlink can use radio frequencies, or spectrum — the kind Starlink would need to reach those 1,000 Mbps speeds — as well as how many satellites it can launch into space.

“If you look at Musk’s various efforts to improve his position on the spectrum, whatever his batting average is, it’s not hot,” Levin told CNET. “It will be much bigger (after Trump’s victory). And this is a very significant victory.”

Musk could also push for a Republican administration to end programs that subsidize his competitors, such as the Universal Service Fund, which supports broadband deployment in rural areas, public institutions and low-income Americans. USF includes RDOF — the same one that rejected Starlink’s $900 million request last year.

“Think about the last 8 percent of homes that don’t have what we think of as broadband service — that’s the most easily addressable market for Starlink,” Levin told CNET. “Would it be better for Starlink to get a small percentage of government funding or no government funding for those areas? It’s pretty obvious to me that they’re better off with neither.”

USF is administered by the FCC and has an annual budget of approx 9 billion dollarsnone of which ever went to Starlink.

“I doubt Elon Musk or his people will say, ‘We want to kill USF.’ That won’t happen. But USF has both economic and legal problems, and if you don’t fix them, eventually they fall apart,” Levin said.

Musk did not respond to a request for comment.