The president could tighten federal oversight of the tech titan’s businesses, even if heavy reliance by the Pentagon and NASA on them makes terminating Mr. Musk’s contracts less feasible.

© Joe Skipper/Reuters

President Trump’s decision to pull a close associate of Elon Musk’s out of the running to lead NASA helped doom an extraordinary partnership.

© Haiyun Jiang for The New York Times

For all the insults that Mr. Musk and Mr. Trump traded on Thursday, don’t be surprised if they make up again days from now. In the meantime, they both benefit.

© Pool photo by Brandon Bell

If President Trump cancels the contracts for Elon Musk’s private spaceflight company, the federal government would struggle to achieve many goals in orbit and beyond.

© NASA, via Associated Press

The loss of the Resilience spacecraft by Ispace repeated a crash into the moon in 2023 of the company’s first robotic lunar landing mission.

© ispace, inc., via Associated Press