NYT reports Elon Musk’s drug use went ‘well beyond occasional’ in 2024

Elon Musk may have understated the “small amount” of ketamine that he said he was using in a Don Lemon interview last year, according to sources for The New York Times. The publication reports that around the time Musk endorsed Donald Trump’s presidential run last year, the Tesla CEO told people that he was taking so much ketamine that it was affecting his bladder, a side effect associated with chronic use. “It is unclear” whether this extended to his four-month stint running DOGE, according to the Times.

The Times reports that, based on interviews with more than a dozen people who’ve known or worked with Musk and private messages seen by the publication, “…some people who knew him worried about his frequent drug use, mood swings and fixation on having more children.”

The Times cites sources familiar with Musk’s consumption who said he was sometimes using ketamine daily and mixing it with a cocktail of other unspecified drugs. Daily consumption would greatly surpass the prescribed treatments that Musk told Lemon he was taking once every two weeks to treat depression. While government contractors like SpaceX are obligated to administer random drug tests to employees, including Elon, people close to this process told The Times that Musk received advanced warning about when they would occur.

A January 2024 report in The Wall Street Journal cited sources saying Musk “used LSD, cocaine, ecstasy and psychedelic mushrooms, often at private parties around the world, where attendees sign nondisclosure agreements or give up their phones to enter.” Sources cited by the Journal also said that “some Tesla board members over the years have talked among themselves about their concerns over Musk’s alleged drug use,” and that drugs have “been a thorny topic for directors at Musk’s companies because some of them are his close friends, and attend parties and travel with him.”