Elon Musk will take 'anyone' to Mars - but only if Donald Trump wins Presidential election, SpaceX owner claims
23 September 2024, 08:08
Elon Musk has vowed to get "anyone who wants to be a space traveller" to Mars but only if Donald Trump wins the US presidential election.
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Taking to his social media platform X on Sunday, the SpaceX owner revealed he plans to send five spaceships to Mars within two years.
“If those all land safely, then crewed missions are possible in four years. If we encounter challenges, then the crewed missions will be postponed another two years,” he added.
Musk, a vocal supporter of Donald Trump, claimed humanity's hopes of reaching the red planet would be stalled by a Democratic presidency.
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He wrote: “While I have many concerns about a potential Kamala regime, my absolute showstopper is that the bureaucracy currently choking America to death is guaranteed to grow under a Democratic Party administration.”
Earlier this month Musk said: "We will never reach Mars if Kamala wins."
Donald Trump has echoed Musk’s claims, telling voters he is the man to take the United States to Mars.
"I'll talk to Elon," he said at a rally on Saturday.
"Elon, get those rocket ships going."
Musk has pointed to Government red tape as the key reason for the United States’ stalling space programme.
“One of my biggest concerns right now is that the Starship program is being smothered by a mountain of government bureaucracy that grows every year,” he wrote.
“This stifling red tape is affecting all large projects in America, which is why, for example, California has spent ~$7 billion dollars and several years on high-speed rail, but only has a 1600 ft section of concrete to show for it!”
Elon Musk has claimed he is a short time away from taking humanity to mars on a number of occasions.
In 2011, he said SpaceX would land on mars “within 10 years.”
In 2020, he said it would be “around six years” before humans landed on Mars.
