Billionaire Elon Musk has endorsed Republican former President Donald Trump in the race for the White House, but employees at his collection of companies are largely donating to Trump’s Democratic rival Kamala Harris.

Workers at Tesla have contributed $42,824 to Harris’ presidential campaign versus $24,840 to Trump’s campaign, according to OpenSecrets, a nonpartisan nonprofit that tracks U.S. campaign contributions and lobbying data.

Employees at Musk’s rocket company SpaceX have donated $34,526 to Harris versus $7,652 to Trump. Employees at the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter, have donated $13,213 to Harris versus less than $500 to Trump.

While the figures are relatively small for campaign fundraising, they indicate political leanings at odds with Musk’s own. The world’s richest man, Musk has boosted Trump on X and dismissed left-leaning ideas as a “woke-mind virus.”

Musk did not immediately respond to a request for comment. He backed President Joe Biden in 2020 but has tacked rightward since then. Trump has said that if he wins the Nov. 5 election, he will appoint Musk to lead a government efficiency commission.

The OpenSecrets data includes donations from company employees and owners and those individuals’ immediate family members. Campaign finance laws prohibit companies themselves from donating to federal campaigns.

Many of Musk’s employees are based in California, a Democratic stronghold, said Ross Gerber, CEO of Gerber Kawasaki Wealth and Investment Management, which is a Tesla shareholder. Gerber is also an investor in X.

In July, Musk said he would move X and SpaceX headquarters to Texas from California because of a California gender-identity law he called the “last straw.” Gerber said such a move would mean “losing out on a lot of potential talent” in California.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk. File.
| Photo Credit: AP

Elon Musk has deleted a post on his social media platform X in which he said “no one is even trying to assassinate” President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris in the wake of an apparent assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump while he was playing golf.

Mr. Musk, who has nearly 200 million followers on the social media site he bought for $44 billion in 2022, has increasingly embraced conservative ideologies in recent years and endorsed Trump for president.

Also read | Trump blames Biden and Harris ‘rhetoric’ for assassination bids

While he has removed posts in the past, Mr. Musk has also kept up and even doubled down on other such inflammatory comments. Last week, he made a joke about impregnating Taylor Swift after the singer posted an endorsement for Ms. Harris.

Early Monday, after taking down the post about the apparent Trump assassination, the 53-year-old billionaire wrote on the platform: “Well, one lesson I’ve learned is that just because I say something to a group and they laugh doesn’t mean it’s going to be all that hilarious as a post on X.” The original post was in response to DogeDesigner, one of the 700 accounts that Musk follows, who asked: “Why they want to kill Donald Trump?” Musk’s reply was quickly condemned by many X users, and “DeportElonMusk” began trending on X on Monday morning.

“Violence should only be condemned, never encouraged or joked about,” said White House spokesperson Andrew Bates in response to mr. Musk’s post. “This rhetoric is irresponsible.” The Tesla CEO has previously posted conspiracy theories and feuded with world leaders and politicians. X is currently banned in Brazil amid a dustup between Musk and a Brazilian Supreme Court judge over free speech, far-right accounts and misinformation.

He’s also received criticism in the past for what critics said were posts encouraging violence.

Last month, for instance, the British government called on Musk to act responsibly after he used X to unleash a barrage of posts that officials said risked inflaming violent unrest gripping the country.

Mr. Musk said when he bought the platform then known as Twitter that protecting free speech — not money — was his motivation because, as he put it, “having a public platform that is maximally trusted and broadly inclusive is extremely important to the future of civilisation.” Sarah Kreps, director of Cornell University’s Tech Policy Institute, noted that Musk has long been trying to “push the boundaries of free speech, in part by engaging in impulsive, unfiltered comments on a range of political topics.”