Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has reportedly embarked on a mission to father thousands of children as part of a personal crusade to combat what he perceives as a global population crisis. According to leaked messages and multiple insider accounts, the billionaire envisions fathering as many as 5,000 children, using IVF, surrogacy, and selective parenting to "seed the Earth with more human beings of high intelligence."
The revelations come amid rising scrutiny over Musk's personal life, which already includes at least 14 known children with four different women. His most recent child, named Seldon Lycurgus, was announced in February by Shivon Zilis, a Yale-educated venture capitalist and mother of four of Musk's children.
In leaked text messages shared by MAGA influencer Ashley St Clair, Musk allegedly wrote: "To reach legion level before the apocalypse we will need to use surrogates." A Roman legion typically consisted of 5,000 soldiers. The texts suggest Musk urged St Clair, with whom he shares a son named Romulus, to use a surrogate for future pregnancies to accelerate the process.
St Clair, 26, also claimed Musk offered her $15 million and $100,000 per month until their child turned 21 in exchange for keeping the paternity confidential. She declined the offer, telling the Wall Street Journal she didn't want her son "to feel like he's a secret."
Musk's pro-natalist ideology has long been public. At a 2023 conference in Saudi Arabia, he warned that low birth rates are the "single biggest problem" facing most nations. "If you don't make new humans, there's no humanity, and all the policies in the world don't matter," Musk said. "I mean, you know, you've got to walk the talk. So, I do have a lot of kids, and I encourage others to have lots of kids."
Sources close to Musk say his efforts are deliberate and clinical. He allegedly favors IVF to control the baby's sex-nearly all his children are boys-and encourages mothers to deliver by caesarean section to maximize skull and brain size.
Zilis told Musk's biographer that she was encouraged by Musk to have children because "he really wants smart people to have kids." The pair's children include twins Strider and Azure, born in 2021, and daughter Arcadia, born two years later.
Musk has also fathered three children with musician Grimes-X Æ A-Xii, Exa Dark Sideræl, and Tau Techno Mechanicus-and six with his first wife, author Justine Wilson. One child died in infancy. Reports indicate he has privately offered his sperm to multiple acquaintances, including a couple he met at a Silicon Valley dinner party and Nicole Shanahan, the ex-wife of Google co-founder Sergey Brin.
St Clair further alleged that Japanese officials approached Musk in 2023 to donate sperm to a "high-profile woman," an offer he reportedly accepted without disclosing her identity.
While Musk's motivations are framed in existential urgency, some within his circle question the lack of emotional depth in his relationships. According to insiders cited by the Daily Mail, Musk's goal appears less about romance and more about constructing a new generation of high-IQ offspring to stave off what he sees as societal collapse.
Vivian Wilson, one of Musk's children from his first marriage who is estranged from him, told Teen Vogue she is unsure how many siblings she has, underscoring the secrecy surrounding Musk's expanding family tree.
