Peter Thiel’s Deep Ties to Trump’s Top Ranks

A billionaire tech entrepreneur who used his wealth and influence in Silicon Valley to help Donald Trump win the presidency has deep connections to the new administration’s efforts to remake the government.

His name? Peter Thiel.

While Elon Musk and a crew of longtime employees and young acolytes have been fanning out across Washington under the banner of the Department of Government Efficiency, more than a dozen people with ties to Thiel — including current and former employees of his companies, as well as people who have helped manage his fortune or benefitted from his investments and charitable giving — have been folded into the Trump administration.

Some Thiel allies have held high-ranking government posts before, while others are heading to Washington for the first time. Thiel himself has no formal role in the Trump administration.

Musk and Thiel have been intertwined since the early days of PayPal, which Thiel helped found and where Musk briefly served as CEO. Since then, Musk, who leads Tesla Inc., SpaceX and other companies, has become the world’s richest person, while Thiel has built a multifaceted empire ranging from software firm Palantir Technologies Inc. to investment offices with stakes in top Silicon Valley startups.

Read More: The Musk Associates Running the Government

The early bonds between the billionaires have persisted, and others in their orbit have gained power and influence. The so-called PayPal Mafia — a group of Silicon Valley stars with links to the payments app's formative period — has become integral to the second Trump administration. The men — they’re all men — have overlapping business interests and have been outspoken about the importance of US tech dominance.

Thiel is an investor in several of Musk’s companies, including SpaceX, Neuralink and Boring Co., while Musk’s new DOGE effort has borrowed from the Thiel brain trust, recruiting staffers specifically from his world of philanthropy and business.

Several companies that are backed by Thiel depend on government contracts. Since Trump was elected, Palantir’s stock has soared more than 90%. In February, Anduril Industries, a defense technology startup backed by Thiel’s Founders Fund, landed an expanded role in a deal with the US Army that could be valued at more than $20 billion. The week before that announcement, it was reported that Anduril’s valuation could double thanks to a $2.5 billion funding round led by Founders Fund. This week, Scale AI, another Founders Fund portfolio company with its managing director now in the Trump administration, announced a new deal with the Department of Defense.

A spokesperson for Thiel didn’t respond to a request for comment. None of the other individuals named in the graphic below, who were contacted by phone, email or LinkedIn messages, responded to requests for comment.

While links between industry and government have always existed, the current state of play is “unprecedented in the modern era,” said Quinn Slobodian, professor of international history at Boston University.

“The ambition seems to be more than just working at an arm’s length and profiting from state contracts,” Slobodian said. “There is an ambition for a bottom-up renovation of how the government operates.”

Musk had mostly stayed out of politics until last summer, when he became Trump’s biggest financial backer. Thiel was a prominent supporter of Trump in 2016, but later was critical of the president. Before the 2024 election, Thiel said he wouldn’t donate to candidates, though he did say he would vote for Trump, who selected Thiel ally JD Vance as his vice president.

Musk has been very public in wielding his new power, demanding on X that federal workers justify their roles and turning up for press conferences at the White House.

Thiel, meanwhile, has remained off stage as his allies settle in. Here are the people from his world who are now working with the new administration.