Elon Musk vows to start a new political party after Trump feud. Here’s why that’s harder than it sounds.

As a billionaire Elon Musk Feuds with President Trump On his signature Tax legislation and domestic politicalMusk has divided his calls to launch a new political party – an intimidating task even for the richest person in the world.

Musk first floated by launching a third, nicknamed the “America Party”, ” Earlier this monthis part of a bad back and forth between the president and the CEO of Tesla who marked the probable end of their political alliance. Musk again raised the idea this week while the legislators were running to send the Big Beautiful Bill Act to Mr. Trump’s office – and this time, Musk put a delay on the plan.

“If this crazy spending bill, America’s party will be formed the next day,” wrote Musk in a post on X Monday evening, a few hours before the bill adopted the Senate on Tuesday And home. “Our country needs an alternative to the Democrat-Républican Uni-Freshment so that the people really have a voice.”

We do not know if Musk will follow his commitment, but the idea could be easier to say than to do. If Musk decides to launch a new political party, he will have to face a thicket of complicated laws of the State, rules of access to the long ballot and intense disputes.

“Only the richest person in the world could make a serious effort to create a new American political party,” said Brett Kappel, a veteran election lawyer in CBS News.

Navigate 50 laws on different states – and federal rules

“Political parties are creatures of the States,” said Kappel.

Each state has different legal rules to recognize which political parties may appear on the ballot, and these obstacles “will also overcome extraordinarily overcome,” he noted. In some cases, an emerging part of the State may need to put the candidates on the ballot by submitting a large number of signatures, then win a certain percentage of the vote between the electoral cycles.

For example, to qualify in California, a new political party must either register 0.33% of state voters – or around 75,000 people – as registered members, or submit signatures of 1.1 million voters. After that, to stay qualified, the parties must either maintain this registration threshold of 0.33%, or win at least 2% of the vote in a state -of -scale race.

And to gain recognition at the national level, each political party at the level of the state should request an advisory opinion from the Federal Electoral Commission.

These efforts would almost certainly be confronted with an intense decline in democratic and republican parties, including legal challenges on signatures in each state, demanding that musk – or any other third -party founder aspiring – expenditure on dozens of money in dispute.

“State laws in all states are biased towards the two main political parties and make it as difficult as possible for the emergence of a third political party,” Kappel told CBS News.

The process of creating a political party with national ambitions would also be long. Kappel says that it could be doable – although difficult – for Musk to put some favored candidates on the ballot in certain states, but building a brand new national party would probably take years and would not be possible by the mid -term elections of 2026.

For evidence of the difficulty of the process, do not seek further than the difficulties that existing third parties have been faced. The Green Party and the Libertarian Party were each founded decades ago and engaged in state -based state -owned thrusts for access to the ballot and the recognition of parties.

“The obstacles to create a new party and do it on the ballot are extremely high. This can be done if you have endless amounts, but it is a multi -year project and will cost hundreds of millions of dollars,” said Kappel.

Campaign of the musk campaign

The high cost of launching a political party may not be a large stumbling block for Musk, whose net value exceeds $ 350 billion according to Forbes and Bloomberg assessments.

Chef Tesla and SpaceX spent 277 million dollars to help Trump and other republican candidates in the electoral cycle of 2024. The majority of these expenses, about 239 million dollars, was routed by America PAC, a political action committee founded by Musk which has subscribed to a sprawling effort to voting in the Swing States.

Since then, Musk has suggested that he had planned to resume his involvement in politics. His mandate leading the Trump Administration Reduction Department Finished in Maya month later Say Tesla’s shareholders His work with the federal government “will drop considerably”. He Also said During Qatar Economic Forum in May, he “will make political expenses much less” in the future, noting that he “currently did not see a reason” to continue to open his wallet.

If Musk follows his proposal to launch a competitor to the two traditional parties, this would mark an expensive return to the fray – and the laws around the way of finance are complex.

Before the new political parties are officially recognized, they are generally organized as non -profit groups, and their donors are confronted with any limits in their donations, says Kappel. But once a party has obtained national recognition, donors like Musk would be subject to the FEC ceilings on political contributions. Currently, individuals can only give $ 10,000 a year to a state political party, or $ 44,300 per year to a national party committee, according to the FEC.

The rules governing when organizations are subject to these limits are Byzantine. Almost two decades ago, the FEC said that a group called Unity08 – which was aimed at creating a bipartite presidential ticket – was to register as a political committee if it spends more than $ 1,000 trying to obtain access to the ballot. After a long legal battle, a court of appeal canceled this decision.

Another way for Musk to continue influence on political influence would be through America PAC. The group is organized as a great CAP, which allows Musk to give unlimited sums of money, but demands that the group remain officially independent of candidates or political parties.

Even if he thought about his launch of a third party, Musk hinted this week that he could remain engaged in republican policy. The billionaire suggested He will meet the main challenges against the GOP legislators who voted for the law on a major bill on Trump. He also swore to support the representative Thomas Massie, a Kentucky republican who voted against the bill and faces a primary competition supported by Trump.

The president, for his part, said in recent days that Musk seems “upset” that his bill on tax on taxation and domestic policy would eliminate tax credits on electric vehicles – which could Cost billions of Tesla. Some of Musk’s criticisms on the bill focused on its steep reductions in green energy incentives, although it also argued that the bill was too expensive.

“I think that Elon is a wonderful guy, and I know he will always do well,” Trump told Fox News, Maria Bartiromo, in an interview broadcast on Sunday. “But he was a little upset, and it was not appropriate.”