NASA has plans to return humans to the moon with the Artemis mission—but Elon Musk’s preference for Mars could have influence in the Trump administration.

Elon Musk has taken aim at NASA for focusing on exploring the Moon rather than launching missions to Mars. The Red Planet has long been a primary goal for the SpaceX CEO, who hopes to establish a human colony there within his lifetime.

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk is calling for NASA to ditch its Moon program, arguing that the "Moon is a distraction" and that "we're going straight to Mars" instead in a recent tweet. In a separate tweet on Christmas Day,

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has said that he wants to skip the Moon and go straight to Mars. In a post on X, he emphasised the importance of carrying out higher number of rocket launches to increase payload sent to low-Earth orbit and eventually to Mars.

Without naming Mr. Musk directly, Prime Minister Keir Starmer denounced the billionaire’s spreading of falsehoods about a child sex abuse scandal.

Germany has said that Musk's attempts to influence the coming German election are futile as the Tesla CEO voices support for the far right. The UK's Starmer and France's Macron echoed the German government's sentiments.