Axios: The White House Has Assured Ukraine That It Is Not Involved In The Starlink Restrictions

• 15.10.2026, 7:50

Officials in Washington promised to look into the matter.

The administration of U.S. President Donald Trump denies any involvement in the Starlink restrictions in Ukraine. Officials in Washington have promised to seek clarification from SpaceX regarding the incident.

This was reported by Axios.

On Wednesday, October 14, close advisers to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called their counterparts at the White House. They asked whether a decision had been made to restrict Starlink and how to resolve the situation. The Ukrainian side also made similar calls to the CIA and the Pentagon.

The White House responded that it does not control SpaceX. According to one of the publication’s sources, the Trump administration plans to contact the company to determine the causes of the outage.

A high-ranking U.S. official assured that the government was not involved in the restrictions. U.S. officials attribute the situation to a technical malfunction.

At the same time, SpaceX owner Elon Musk stated the opposite just yesterday. According to him, Starshield belongs to the U.S. government, and speed limits for it are set by the U.S. military and, ultimately, the president.

As a reminder, on the night of October 14, Starshield terminals on Ukrainian drones began maintaining communication only up to 160 km/h, and sometimes the signal disappeared even at 80 km/h. Later, the issue was partially resolved, but the 160 km/h limit remained. According to the Ministry of Defense, this is insufficient to intercept jet-powered “Shaheds.”

On the same day, Russia exploited the communication problems and launched one of the largest-scale attacks on Ukraine. Zelenskyy reached out to Musk and urged him to fix the error, which could cost Ukrainians their lives.