A start-up focused on building rare-earth magnets used in key technologies has seen its valuation skyrocket thanks to two investors: the Trump administration and a venture capital firm that counts the president’s son, Donald Trump Jr., as a partner.
Vulcan Elements, which aims to shore up U.S. access to key materials for high technology, has gone from a $200 million valuation to a potential $2 billion one, according to a Bloomberg analysis.
Over the summer, 1789 Capital, which Trump Jr. joined shortly after his father was elected, joined a group of investors backing the firm, which hopes to help the U.S. develop mineral-processing capacity that’s largely in the hands of China.
The Trump administration, which watched as rare-earth minerals became a bargaining chip in tariff negotiations with Beijing, soon followed, offering the company a record-breaking $620 million Defense Department loan, as well as $50 million in CHIPS Act incentives, securing the Commerce Department an equity stake in the company.
The investments deepened ties between 1789 and the administration. In 2019, 1789 co-founder Chris Buskirk founded the Rockbridge Network, an influential group of conservative donors, alongside Vice President JD Vance.
1789 told Bloomberg that neither the company nor Trump Jr. was involved in securing the government investment in the firm.
Trump Jr. and his brother Eric, meanwhile, are also backing a drone company angling for military business, as the Pentagon seeks to bulk up drone capabilities in the face of an onslaught of UAV attacks in the Iran war.
The association between the Trump family business and the Trump administration’s investments has provoked scrutiny from Democrats.
In January, Senators Elizabeth Warren, Richard Blumenthal, and Andy Kim asked the Defense Department for information about the deals, writing that they raise the risk “the Trump family is profiting from funds appropriated by Congress to keep Americans safe, raising both ethics and national security concerns.”
The senators said that since Trump Jr. joined the firm, it has reportedly notched more than $70 million in government contracts from the Trump administration for portfolio companies in fields including artificial intelligence, quantum chips, and rocket engines.
Family members have been accused of leveraging their ties to the Trump administration for personal enrichment, especially in the crypto business.
President Trump and current Trump administration Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff are among the founders of the crypto business World Liberty Financial, a company that is now overseen by their sons.
Four days before Trump’s inauguration, a firm backed by an Abu Dhabi royal, Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, signed a secret deal to buy nearly half of the company. Another company run by the sheikh later used $2 billion in a World Liberty-issued cryptocurrency to make one of its investments.
As The New York Times reported, at the same time the $2 billion World Liberty deal was being negotiated, the UAE was working to secure an agreement with the Trump administration, announced in November, to access thousands of top-line AI chips.
A Tahnoon lieutenant was reportedly working to get one of the Abu Dhabi executive’s firms the American chips from the U.S. and advising the Trump crypto firm at the same time.
All parties have denied any coordination or wrongdoing, describing the two deals as unrelated.
Family members of Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick are also under scrutiny for their involvement in Cantor Fitzgerald, the secretary’s former investment company.
The Trump official transferred his stake in the business to his children through a series of trusts, and his sons now manage Cantor Fitzgerald.
In January, the Trump administration announced it had agreed to extend up to $277 million in funding and up to $1.3 billion in loans to USA Rare Earth Inc., a mining and manufacturing company that turned to Cantor Fitzgerald as the lead placement agent for a series of private investments.
Democratic senators are also scrutinizing those deals, writing to Secretary Lutnick last month that it is “imperative that federal investments in critical industries be made free from conflicts of interest and on the merits.”
