It was revealed that the U.S. Department of Justice has announced that it will drop a discrimination lawsuit against Elon Musk SpaceX, which was filed during the Biden administration and accused the company of discriminating against asylum seekers and refugees in its hiring practices.
According to data from Statista, in 2024, SpaceX successfully launched 106 Falcon 9 carrier rockets this year, with 24 more launches already scheduled. SpaceX plans to launch 95 new rockets by the end of 2031.
Additionally, SpaceX’s valuation has reached $350 billion since Donald Trump’s victory in the U.S. presidential election, according to estimates published by Bloomberg, as the company is not publicly traded and does not have to disclose detailed financial reports to the public.
Discrimination Lawsuit Against Elon Musk’s SpaceX
On Thursday night, the Department of Justice filed an unopposed motion in a federal court in Texas seeking to lift a stay on the case, stating that it intended to formally dismiss the action.
No reason was provided for the withdrawal, although a judge had previously questioned whether the Department of Justice had the authority to bring the claims.
Neither Musk, SpaceX, nor the Department of Justice have issued public statements regarding the latest development.
The lawsuit, filed in 2023, alleged that SpaceX violated federal law by requiring job applicants to be U.S. citizens or permanent residents, even though such a restriction was not legally applicable to many of the positions in question.
Prosecutors argued that the company not only enforced the illegal requirement but also discouraged asylum seekers and refugees from applying.
Musk, a vocal critic of the case, dismissed the allegations as politically motivated. “SpaceX was repeatedly told that hiring anyone who was not a U.S. permanent resident would violate international arms trafficking laws, which would be a criminal offense,” he wrote at the time.
“This is yet another case of the Department of Justice being weaponized for political purposes.”
The decision to drop the lawsuit comes as Musk assumes an increasingly significant role within the Trump administration, spearheading aggressive cost-cutting measures across federal agencies as the leader of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).
The program has led to contract cancellations and staff reductions in multiple agencies, including those that have investigated SpaceX and other Musk-owned companies.
One of the agencies under scrutiny is the Federal Aviation Administration, which had previously proposed fining SpaceX $633,000 for violating launch license requirements during two missions in 2023.
The new Secretary of Transportation, Sean Duffy, recently confirmed in a Senate hearing that DOGE officials had been embedded in the FAA and were reviewing the penalty.
Meanwhile, SpaceX’s regulatory issues seem to be easing elsewhere. Earlier this week, a Texas-based environmental group dropped a separate lawsuit against the company over alleged water pollution at its launch site near Brownsville.
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