US Senator Ed Markey is calling for a public hearing to investigate Elon Musk’s recent statements about the safety of the Federal Aviation Administration’s (FAA) air traffic control technology.
The announcement comes after the FAA said it is considering canceling a $2.4 billion contract with Verizon in favor of Elon Musk’s Starlink.
In a letter to Commerce Committee Chairman Ted Cruz and Ranking Member Maria Cantwell, published on his website on March 3, 2025, Senator Markey said that “Musk’s comments could understandably cause panic among air travelers,” adding that the public is more anxious about air travel due to several recent aircraft crashes.
“Although the FAA’s information technology systems need modernization, Musk’s alarmist rhetoric appears extreme,” Markey wrote. “If he has discovered new vulnerabilities in the FAA’s Air Traffic Control system, the Committee should know about such information immediately.”
Musk holds two key roles as the CEO of Tesla, SpaceX, and X, as well as being a senior adviser to US President Donald Trump. However, this raises concerns about a potential conflict of interest in the awarding of certain government contracts.
On March 3, 2025, Sharice Davids, a member of the US House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee’s Aviation Subcommittee, stated that “the administration must ensure federal contracts are awarded through a fair and transparent process, not at the whim of a billionaire with political ties to those in power.”
On February 27, 2025, Elon Musk said on X that “the Verizon communication system to air traffic control is breaking down very rapidly.” He added that the FAA’s evaluation indicates “single digit months to catastrophic failure”.
Musk later admitted that he made a mistake when he claimed Verizon managed the FAA’s communications system, updating his statement on X to clarify that “the ancient system that is rapidly declining in capability was made L3Harris,” while “the new system that is not yet operational is from Verizon.”
Concluding the letter, Senator Markey wrote: “If Musk cannot provide evidence of his claims, it raises serious questions about whether he is using his role as a senior government official to enrich his company SpaceX, currently competing for FAA contracts. In either case, the Commerce Committee has a responsibility to immediately hold a public hearing to investigate Musk’s claims on behalf of the American public.”
