Democrats in the US Senate launch investigation into Starshield in Ukraine

The US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, after the Democrats’ victory in the midterm elections, has begun preparing an investigation into the actions of President Donald Trump’s administration over the past two years, including the issue of restricting the operation of Starshield in Ukraine.

This was reported to CNN by an aide to one of the Democratic senators.

The committee sent letters to the White House, as well as to billionaire and SpaceX head Elon Musk, asking them to preserve documents regarding the slowdown of Starshield’s operations. In addition, letters were sent to ports, banks, and private organizations involved in a deal with Russian diesel fuel. The CNN source called this “standard committee procedure.”

Starlink is SpaceX’s commercial satellite network for broadband internet access, used by individuals, companies, and government agencies. Starshield is a separate SpaceX line of business intended for government national security tasks, including secure communications, Earth observation, and hosting specialized equipment on satellites; it provides additional cryptographic protection and work with classified data. At the same time, Starshield uses Starlink technologies, and some of its communication services rely on the same satellite constellation and ground infrastructure. The key difference lies in purpose and control: Starlink is a commercial service managed by SpaceX, whereas Starshield systems are under the control of the US government.

As The Economist reported, Elon Musk gave the order to restrict Starlink’s operation in Ukraine in order to punish Kyiv for strikes on Russian oil refineries. The Wall Street Journal also reported that this was a personal order from the SpaceX head. According to The Telegraph, Musk proposed restricting the system’s operation, and US President Donald Trump agreed.

Musk, in turn, has stated that Starshield belongs to the US government and is managed by it, so the terms of use of the network are determined by Washington. Trump himself denied his involvement in the restrictions. Secretary of State Marco Rubio also claimed that the US government did not issue orders to slow down Starlink.

On October 24, the Ukrainian authorities reported that Starshield had resumed operation on the territory of Ukraine. On the same day, Musk accused Kyiv of violating the terms of use of Starlink. According to him, Ukraine used a “loophole” to employ the terminals for offensive drone strikes. Musk later published a screenshot of a post by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on X in which the Ukrainian leader speaks about using Starlink for strikes.

“For all the fools: Zelensky himself published a post about using Starlink for offensive strikes with drones, which has always contradicted the terms of use of Starlink,” the SpaceX head wrote.

Kyiv rejected Musk’s accusations of violating the terms of use of the terminals, The Washington Post reported. A source in the Ukrainian president’s office told the newspaper that SpaceX had not contacted Ukraine regarding these accusations. Zelensky himself also said that Musk did not contact him after the restrictions on Starshield’s operation in Ukraine.

Amid the disruptions in the system’s operation, nine US senators — four Republicans and five Democrats — sent a request to the Pentagon asking for a review. They asked to establish whether employees of the US Defense Department or other American agencies had given instructions to change the operation of the systems, authorized them, or knew about them in advance. The appeal also concerned intelligence sharing and early warning capabilities. As the Associated Press and Bloomberg reported, the Pentagon inspector general’s office declined the group of senators’ request.