The Trump administration quietly paid Elon Musk's SpaceX nearly $1.2 million in government contracts, despite previously characterizing the services as a “gift,” according to a report.

SpaceX was handed four contracts from March 2025 to June this year for Starlink services provided to the White House Communications Agency, a military unit responsible for managing secure comms for the president and executive officials, The Washington Post r eports.

The contracts amount to nearly $1.2 million, but in March last year, White House officials said that Starlink “donated” the service, per a New York Times report that has resurfaced.

“The gift had been vetted by the lawyer overseeing ethics issues in the White House Counsel’s Office,” the Times report stated, citing a White House official.

Three of the payments totalling $502,000 were reported last week by the legal advocacy group Democracy Defenders Fund.…