• by Tanya Gazdik , July 16, 2024

Elon Musk announced on social media that he is moving the last of his businesses from California to Texas. 

Musk said he is moving the headquarters of two of his companies, X and SpaceX, to Texas from California, according to The Wall Street Journal. At issue is a newly signed California law that aims to prevent schools from informing families if their children identify as gay or transgender.

“This is the final straw,” Musk wrote on X, which he owns, citing the new California law, as well as “many others that preceded it, attacking both families and companies."

The law, signed by Governor Newsom on Monday, is the Support Academic Futures and Educators for Today’s Youth Act, or SAFETY Act—which prevents a school employee from being required “to disclose any information related to a pupil’s sexual orientation, gender identity, or gender expression to any other person without the pupil’s consent.”

The law makes California the first state in the U.S. to ban policies that force schools to out students by requiring they notify parents if a student wants to use a name or pronoun other than what’s on their birth certificate, The Mercury News reported.

Musk said his rocket company SpaceX will move its headquarters from Hawthorne, California, to Starbase, Texas. He said X would move from San Francisco to Austin, Texas. 

“Tesla, where Musk is CEO, moved its corporate headquarters to Austin from Palo Alto, California in 2021,” according to ABC News.  “Musk has also said that he has moved his residence from California to Texas, where there is no state personal income tax.”

Musk posted that he has "had enough of dodging gangs of violent drug addicts just to get in and out of the building.”

Musk wrote that he “did make it clear to Governor Newsom about a year ago that laws of this nature would force families and companies to leave California to protect their children.”

The move is “a blow to Southern California, where SpaceX has helped to anchor a burgeoning space economy,” per the Los Angeles Times. 

The Wall Street Journal also reported that Musk is committing $45 million a month to a new pro-Trump Super PAC, according to people familiar with the matter.