President Donald Trump asked Elon Musk to ease restrictions on the military-grade version of SpaceX's Starlink system in Ukraine, The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday. The newspaper cited U.S. officials who said the Starshield system, which Ukraine relies on in its war against Russia, was working more normally shortly after the two men spoke by phone.
The report follows a Tuesday article from The Wall Street Journal stating that Musk, the founder and CEO of SpaceX, had ordered the slowdown. At the time, Musk was described as a critic of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. Two unnamed sources in that earlier report indicated that Trump and Musk discussed the throttling decision soon after the change became public last week. One source told the Journal that Musk had spoken to Trump prior to imposing the speed cap.
Trump has repeatedly denied involvement in the decision. On Wednesday, he stated, "I don't know who did it, but I was not involved." The controversy emerged as Trump intensified criticism of Zelenskyy for targeting Russian energy infrastructure. Concurrently, Trump has pursued a deal to ease sanctions on Russia to allow it to supply some diesel on the global market.
Lawmakers from both parties expressed concern over the disruption. Speaking on CNBC's "Squawk Box" on Wednesday, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, questioned whether Musk would have throttled Starlink without White House approval. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., launched an inquiry on Thursday into how SpaceX's satellite technology was degraded for Ukraine without notice.
Blumenthal, the ranking member of the Senate homeland security committee's investigations subcommittee, sent letters to Musk and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. In the correspondence, he argued that limiting critical technology for a key ally put Ukrainian forces and their people in peril. He also raised questions about who controls critical capabilities that the U.S. government has spent billions of dollars to procure.
The White House and an email associated with Musk did not immediately respond to CNBC's requests for comment regarding the report that Trump had asked Musk to lift the restrictions.