Last November, Javier MillaisElectedMinutes after the announcement of the president of South America’s second-largest country, Elon MuskPosted on X: “Argentina will prosper.”

Since then, Musk has continued to promote Miller using the social network X, which he owns. The billionaire shared a video of the Argentine president railing against “social justice” with his 182 million followers. One of the doctored images suggested that watching Miller’s speech was better than having sex, which became one of Musk’s most viewed posts of all time.

Musk helped thisMilitant LiberalBut offline, he used that relationship to benefit his other businesses, electric car maker Tesla and rocket company SpaceX.

“Elon Musk called me,” Milley said a few weeks after taking the job.TV interview“He was very interested in lithium.”

Musk has declared lithium — a silvery-white element that is the main ingredient in Tesla car batteries — to be the “new oil.” Tesla has long reaped the benefits of owning the world’sThe second largest lithium reserveNow, Miller is pushing for major benefits for international lithium miners, which could give Tesla access to a steadier and potentially cheaper source of lithium.

Milley is part of a pattern of Musk cultivating relationships with a group of right-wing heads of state, whose beneficiaries are clearly his company and himself.

Musk, 52, has repeatedly used part of his business empire — formerly known as Twitter’s X — to verbally support politicians such as Milley, Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro and India’s Narendra Modi. On the platform, Musk has supported their views on gender, praised their opposition to socialism and activelyFighting their enemiesTwo former X employees said Musk even personally intervened in X’s content policy, appearing to help Bolsonaro.

Musk has thus secured and won corporate advantages for his most profitable businesses, Tesla and SpaceX, according to an investigation by The New York Times. In India, he secured lower import tariffs for Tesla cars. In Brazil, he securedSpaceX’s satellite internet service StarlinkA major new market was opened up. In Argentina, he obtained minerals crucial for Tesla’s batteries.

Musk’s endorsement has given more international cachet to many nationalist and right-wing heads of state, who have eagerly cited it as validation of their policies and popularity. Last month, as India was preparing to host Musk in New Delhi as the country headed for an election, Modi touted the billionaire’s visit as proof of his leadership.

“People come, they trust me,” the Indian prime minister said in a television interview before Musk postponed his trip.

Musk, Tesla, SpaceX and X did not respond to requests for comment.

Musk welcomed Modi to Tesla’s factory in Fremont, California, in September 2015. Modi was in the United States meeting with business leaders a year after his Bharatiya Janata Party came to power and Modi, a Hindu nationalist politician, was elected prime minister.

Musk and Modi stood next to a gleaming red Model S car under Indian and American flags at the factory.Group photoMusk said they discussed how “solar panels and battery packs” could provide electricity to rural areas in India without power lines.

“I understood his vision,” Modi said later.

It was Musk’s first public meeting with a nationalist leader. It was also the beginning of a long-running relationship between him and Modi, a relationship that took years to develop and began to pay off for him after Musk acquired X.

India is a potentially huge market for Tesla, which needs to expand into new regions to grow. But the country has effectively banned electric vehicles from foreign manufacturers. In recent years, India has imposed tariffs of up to 100% on imported electric vehicles.

Musk initially used traditional personal diplomacy: meeting with Modi and ordering his employees at Tesla to cozy up to officials. In 2017, Tesla wrote to the Indian government to start negotiations to operate in India. Three people familiar with the matter said Tesla made another proposal to Modi’s government in 2019, which was also rejected.

Musk in 2022Acquisition of TwitterThen there was a new tool. The platform, renamed X, is widely used in India — including by Modi, who has nearly 98 million followers — and is a major political forum.

Musk met Modi again when Modi visited New York last June. He said he was a “fan of Modi” and that Modi was “pushing us to make significant investments in India, which is what we intend to do.”

At that time, Tesla employees again discussed lowering tariffs and investing in India with Modi’s advisers, two people familiar with the matter said. Rohan Patel, Tesla’s vice president of public policy and business development, has traveled to India several times, and Indian Commerce Minister Piyush Goyal said in November last year that Tesla would invest in India.visitThe Fremont factory.

In January this year, MuskPost on XHe said India should be given a permanent seat on the UN Security Council, saying it would enhance India’s international status. “It is ridiculous that India, the most populous country on earth, does not have a permanent seat on the Security Council,” he wrote.

It was clear that Modi took notice of the post. Two months later, India announced a partial reduction in import duties for electric car manufacturers that pledged to produce at least $500 million worth of vehicles in India. The policy reduced the duty from 100 percent of the car’s price to 15 percent, specifically for electric cars that retail for more than $35,000.

It’s tailor-made for Tesla, whose Model 3 costs $38,990. BYD, a fast-growing Chinese electric car maker, has been banned from investing in India on national security grounds.

In 2021, Musk took a similar approach to bringing his Starlink satellite internet service to Brazil, which was then led by right-wing populist President Jair Bolsonaro, who was elected three years ago. At that time, Starlink was still in its infancy, with satellites in 25 countries.Less than 150,000 users.

In October 2021, Fabio Faria, Brazil’s communications minister and organizer of Bolsonaro’s re-election campaign, sent Musk a letter saying that “Starlink and Brazil can be great partners,” according to letters obtained under Brazil’s open records law.

A few weeks later, Faria traveled to Texas to visit Musk. Back in Brazil, Faria urged regulators to approve Starlink and at one point urged the Brazilian Space Agency not to get involved in any discussions about SpaceX satellites over the country. He later testified before Brazil’s Congress.

Brazilian regulators approved Starlink’s operations in December 2021, just seven months after the service first applied for it. It was the fastest of five regulatory approvals for satellite internet providers.

Musk later offered a helping hand to Bolsonaro, who faces an uphill battle in his 2022 re-election bid.

On May 20 of that year, Musk made a surprise trip to Brazil to make a major announcement with the president. At an event at a resort near Sao Paulo, they said Starlink was coming to Brazil, where it would provide internet connectivity to 19,000 rural schools and conduct environmental monitoring of the Amazon jungle.Musk was awarded a medalcalling him a “true legend of freedom” because heBid for Twitter.

There’s just one problem: Brazil’s top telecom regulator, Carlos Baigori, who helped approve Starlink for Brazil, said the plan to connect schools never came to fruition. “I don’t think it existed,” he said of the plan.

Brazilian officials said they had no record of Starlink connecting Brazilian schools for free or conducting environmental monitoring.

But Musk and Bolsonaro still benefited from it. According to Brazil’s telecommunications regulator, MuskLet SpaceX gain a foothold in this key marketStarlink currently has 150,000 active accounts in Brazil. Bolsonaro’s campaign promoted the president’s business acumen before the election and promoted him as aShaped into a defender of the Amazon jungle.

Musk’s support did not stop Bolsonaro from launching aLost toBut a few weeks later, Musk, who had just completed the Twitter deal, tried again to help Bolsonaro.

Bolsonaro supporters take to Twitter to accuse Brazilian judgeCommand social networkDeleting right-wing posts and accounts to sway the election. They camped outside military bases.Calls for overturning election resultsmeanwhile, Musk fueled their suspicions by suggesting that Twitter’s former boss had contributed to Bolsonaro’s defeat.

In December 2022, Musk said without citing any evidencePost“Twitter staff may be more inclined to favor left-wing candidates,” he said.Later wrotethe company’s “Brazilian team may have people with strong political biases.”

In 2022, Tesla’sA lithium supplierAnnounceInvesting $1.1 billionSince then, Musk has taken a keen interest in Argentine politics — and Milley in particular — and it has become one of the most obvious bromances in Musk’s political relationships.

Last September, MuskReply on XIn a post on the CNN affiliate of the National Interest, former Fox News host Tucker Carlson wrote that Milley “will make a big difference.” Carlson called Milley, then a candidate, “the next president of Argentina.”

Milley is a libertarian economist and television commentator who campaigned on a proposal to get government out of the economy and tie Argentina more closely to the U.S. Like Musk, he frequently insults critics, is an avid social media user and worries deeply about the threat of “woke” culture.

The two spoke directly for the first time in December, days before Milley took office, when Musk asked about Argentina’s lithium mines. In the months since, Milley has been pushing for legislation to make lithium mining in Argentina more attractive to foreign investors.

His wide-ranging bill would give him sweeping emergency powers over Argentina’s economy and energy over the next year and include a big boon for Tesla: major incentives for foreign investors in large projects, particularly in mining.

These companies will receive significant tax breaks, tariff exemptions and foreign exchange benefits, as well as tax and regulatory certainty for the next 30 years. Tesla’s lithium suppliers may well qualify. If so, Mile’s plan would give Tesla stability and predictability in access to lithium in Argentina until at least 2054.

The proposal was passed by the lower house of Argentina’s Congress on April 30.

Musk sees other benefits in Milley, who as one of his first acts as president passed an executive order containing 366 provisions. In summarizing the highlights of the order in a televised speech, Milley mentioned only one corporate brand by name: Starlink.

SpaceX has been pushing for approval of the Starlink project in Argentina since 2022, but faced bureaucratic obstacles. Mire quickly cut regulations on satellite internet, and Starlink began operating in the country in March of this year.