WSJ editors warn Trump just made Republicans look like 'crony capitalism kings'
Matthew Chapman
September 8, 2025
RAW STORY
The conservative Wall Street Journal editorial board laid into President Donald Trump on Monday evening for his latest $17 billion effort to interfere in the telecommunications market.
"President Trump has now rescued Charlie Ergen’s EchoStar from bankruptcy after his first-term attempt to boost the telecom company flopped," wrote the board, which has grown exasperated with Trump over his tariff wars in recent months. "EchoStar on Monday announced it will sell a large swath of wireless spectrum licenses to Elon Musk’s SpaceX for $17 billion to boost its Starlink satellite network. This follows EchoStar’s deal last month to sell $23 billion in spectrum licenses to AT&T. While the sales will benefit telecom consumers, the biggest winner is Mr. Ergen."
This entire deal, forced by Trump and his regulators to prevent embarrassing headlines about a major bankruptcy on his watch, essentially takes EchoStar out of the wireless industry, which it was only in because of another intervention by Trump in his first term, the board argued.
"As a condition for approving Sprint’s merger with T-Mobile in 2019, the Trump team required the carriers to sell spectrum and Sprint’s pre-paid Boost wireless business to Dish Network, now owned by EchoStar," wrote the board. "Dish had spent years stockpiling spectrum. The Administration’s goal was to stand up a fourth competitor to the Big Three carriers."
"We’re told that Mr. Ergen met with Mr. Trump in June in an effort to prevent the FCC from reclaiming EchoStar’s licenses and putting them up for auction," noted the board. "Republicans in Congress believed an auction could raise tens of billions of dollars for the government. It would also let companies bid competitively for EchoStar’s idle spectrum" — but Trump didn't want that to happen because it would make his economic record look worse.
Making the whole thing more embarrassing, the board wrote, EchoStar announced the AT&T sale as a move to “enable rapid deployment of the purchased spectrum to U.S. consumers across the country” — effectively a confession they are "being rewarded for warehousing spectrum and selling licenses for a higher value than he paid for them," which the law is supposed to stop.
Democrats, too, have interfered in telecom operations for political gain, the board concluded, but with the GOP in power now, "their rampant regulatory intervention in markets on behalf of businesses that do their bidding is giving Democrats the evidence to build a case that Republicans are the new kings of crony capitalism."
The conservative Wall Street Journal editorial board laid into President Donald Trump on Monday evening for his latest $17 billion effort to interfere in the telecommunications market.
"President Trump has now rescued Charlie Ergen’s EchoStar from bankruptcy after his first-term attempt to boost the telecom company flopped," wrote the board, which has grown exasperated with Trump over his tariff wars in recent months. "EchoStar on Monday announced it will sell a large swath of wireless spectrum licenses to Elon Musk’s SpaceX for $17 billion to boost its Starlink satellite network. This follows EchoStar’s deal last month to sell $23 billion in spectrum licenses to AT&T. While the sales will benefit telecom consumers, the biggest winner is Mr. Ergen."
This entire deal, forced by Trump and his regulators to prevent embarrassing headlines about a major bankruptcy on his watch, essentially takes EchoStar out of the wireless industry, which it was only in because of another intervention by Trump in his first term, the board argued.
"As a condition for approving Sprint’s merger with T-Mobile in 2019, the Trump team required the carriers to sell spectrum and Sprint’s pre-paid Boost wireless business to Dish Network, now owned by EchoStar," wrote the board. "Dish had spent years stockpiling spectrum. The Administration’s goal was to stand up a fourth competitor to the Big Three carriers."
"We’re told that Mr. Ergen met with Mr. Trump in June in an effort to prevent the FCC from reclaiming EchoStar’s licenses and putting them up for auction," noted the board. "Republicans in Congress believed an auction could raise tens of billions of dollars for the government. It would also let companies bid competitively for EchoStar’s idle spectrum" — but Trump didn't want that to happen because it would make his economic record look worse.
Making the whole thing more embarrassing, the board wrote, EchoStar announced the AT&T sale as a move to “enable rapid deployment of the purchased spectrum to U.S. consumers across the country” — effectively a confession they are "being rewarded for warehousing spectrum and selling licenses for a higher value than he paid for them," which the law is supposed to stop.
Democrats, too, have interfered in telecom operations for political gain, the board concluded, but with the GOP in power now, "their rampant regulatory intervention in markets on behalf of businesses that do their bidding is giving Democrats the evidence to build a case that Republicans are the new kings of crony capitalism."
MDA Space caught off guard by EchoStar’s deal cancellation, CEO says
By The Canadian Press
Updated: September 08, 2025
By The Canadian Press
Updated: September 08, 2025
SpaceX's mega rocket Starship is prepared for a test flight from Starbase in Boca Chica, Texas, Sunday, Jan. 12, 2025. (AP Photo/Eric Gay) (Eric Gay/AP)
BRAMPTON — Shares of MDA Space Ltd. fell sharply Monday as the high-tech manufacturer lost a recently announced contract with EchoStar Corp.
EchoStar cancelled the deal as it separately announced an agreement to sell its spectrum licenses to SpaceX for about US$17 billion in cash and shares, as the Elon Musk-founded SpaceX pushes further into providing satellite-based internet services directly to smartphones.
The decision by EchoStar to abruptly abandon plans to develop its own space-based network, and instead sell its AWS-4 and H-block spectrum rights to SpaceX, caught MDA Space by surprise, said chief executive Mike Greenley.
“This is a very unexpected event,” he said on a hastily arranged analyst call.
“This is obviously very sudden and a drastic change to the entire trajectory of EchoStar’s business. And so that’s a highly, highly unusual situation.”
The about-face means MDA Space is losing its contract to be the primary supplier for EchoStar’s low Earth orbit satellite constellation. The initial contract announced on Aug. 1 was valued at about US$1.3 billion, while it had the potential to grow to US$2.5 billion.
MDA Space said the EchoStar contract termination is unrelated to its performance and that it will be compensated for all related termination costs and fees under the agreement. The amounts owed were not disclosed.
It also noted it still has a $4.6 billion backlog of deals excluding EchoStar, and the company reiterated its 2025 financial outlook and guidance, but shares were still down about $8.76, or 20 per cent, at $35.25 as of midday on the Toronto Stock Exchange.
The loss, however, puts its shares back to about where they were trading in early summer and still more than double the price of a year ago.
EchoStar was set to be MDA Space’s anchor customer for its new 5G-capable satellites, but the company is also in talks with other firms to be a provider in an accelerating market, said Greenley. He said the August deal caused thinks to perk up, and this latest development will likely add to interest.
“If now SpaceX has that spectrum, and they’re going to get on with building that same network that EchoStar was going to build, it at least equally if not further adds to the giddy-up feeling for those in the market, which is that we better get going here because things are moving.”
Interest in the satellite-provider market is also rising as geopolitical tensions rise globally, he said.
“We’ve already seen in 2025, a fair amount of geopolitical activity, of countries and corporations in countries outside the United States wanting to stand up a bit taller, and work on and improve their high-tech, their defence, their security, their sovereignty.”
MDA Space, originally known as MacDonald, Dettwiler & Associates, also has contracts in place to design and deliver the flight system for the Canadarm3, satellites for Globalstar’s broadband network and robotics on the International Space Station.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 8, 2025.
By Ian Bickis
BRAMPTON — Shares of MDA Space Ltd. fell sharply Monday as the high-tech manufacturer lost a recently announced contract with EchoStar Corp.
EchoStar cancelled the deal as it separately announced an agreement to sell its spectrum licenses to SpaceX for about US$17 billion in cash and shares, as the Elon Musk-founded SpaceX pushes further into providing satellite-based internet services directly to smartphones.
The decision by EchoStar to abruptly abandon plans to develop its own space-based network, and instead sell its AWS-4 and H-block spectrum rights to SpaceX, caught MDA Space by surprise, said chief executive Mike Greenley.
“This is a very unexpected event,” he said on a hastily arranged analyst call.
“This is obviously very sudden and a drastic change to the entire trajectory of EchoStar’s business. And so that’s a highly, highly unusual situation.”
The about-face means MDA Space is losing its contract to be the primary supplier for EchoStar’s low Earth orbit satellite constellation. The initial contract announced on Aug. 1 was valued at about US$1.3 billion, while it had the potential to grow to US$2.5 billion.
MDA Space said the EchoStar contract termination is unrelated to its performance and that it will be compensated for all related termination costs and fees under the agreement. The amounts owed were not disclosed.
It also noted it still has a $4.6 billion backlog of deals excluding EchoStar, and the company reiterated its 2025 financial outlook and guidance, but shares were still down about $8.76, or 20 per cent, at $35.25 as of midday on the Toronto Stock Exchange.
The loss, however, puts its shares back to about where they were trading in early summer and still more than double the price of a year ago.
EchoStar was set to be MDA Space’s anchor customer for its new 5G-capable satellites, but the company is also in talks with other firms to be a provider in an accelerating market, said Greenley. He said the August deal caused thinks to perk up, and this latest development will likely add to interest.
“If now SpaceX has that spectrum, and they’re going to get on with building that same network that EchoStar was going to build, it at least equally if not further adds to the giddy-up feeling for those in the market, which is that we better get going here because things are moving.”
Interest in the satellite-provider market is also rising as geopolitical tensions rise globally, he said.
“We’ve already seen in 2025, a fair amount of geopolitical activity, of countries and corporations in countries outside the United States wanting to stand up a bit taller, and work on and improve their high-tech, their defence, their security, their sovereignty.”
MDA Space, originally known as MacDonald, Dettwiler & Associates, also has contracts in place to design and deliver the flight system for the Canadarm3, satellites for Globalstar’s broadband network and robotics on the International Space Station.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 8, 2025.
By Ian Bickis
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