South Texas residents living on SpaceX property have formally petitioned Cameron County to become an incorporated city.

This is not even Musk’s first foray into company towns—a model that sees its roots in anti-labor organization and corporatist fascism. Farther north in Texas, near the outskirts of Austin, SpaceX operates Snailbrook, a city incorporated in 2021 and pitched as a sort of utopia for SpaceX and Boring Company employees.

Elon Musk wants SpaceX ’s South Texas Starbase facility to expand into its own, legally demarcated city. The billionaire and incoming Trump administration advisor announced the new municipal plans on December 12th on his social media platform,