The record had been quickly scrubbed to eliminate mention of Tesla following news reports of the pricey contract going to a company even as the CEO of that same company, Elon Musk, was working for the government firing people and cutting other contracts as head of the Department of Government Accountability in what appeared to be a tremendous conflict of interest.
Newly obtained records reportedly appear to indicate that President Donald Trump’s State Department was in fact aiming to arrange a $400 million government contract with one of Elon Musk's companies, even as it downplayed the lucrative deal when it was exposed by the media.
The State Department said after the reports earlier this month that it was abandoning plans to buy $400 million worth of "armored electric vehicles” that had earlier listed Tesla as the intended provider in its own document.
Experts interviewed by NPR said that $400 million might be a ballpark figure to replace the State Department's entire fleet of diplomatic vehicles with Tesla Cybertrucks, but expressed doubts about the wisdom of doing so.
It comes as Musk continues to orchestrate massive budget cutbacks and layoffs of federal employees on behalf of Donald Trump, even though his own companies have been promised or paid nearly $21 billion in federal funding since 2008.
