Republican Senator Thom Tillis said he will launch an investigation into Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and his team over the outage in the Pentagon-contracted Starshield system, calling it "at best, this was an unacceptable mistake, and at worst, a deliberate decision to clear the way for a Russian attack." In Europe, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas said the bloc cannot replace Starlink's capabilities for Ukraine in the short term, while Dutch Prime Minister Rob Jetten said he discussed developing European alternatives with French President Emmanuel Macron.
The statements follow a Reuters report citing two US officials and a Western official that the order to slow Ukraine's Starshield service originated inside the White House, though the White House said President Donald Trump made no such request. SpaceX CEO Elon Musk had previously denied responsibility for the throttling—which capped moving terminals at 160 km/h (100 mph) and at times 60 to 70 km/h, disrupting interceptor drones used against Russian jet-powered Shaheds—stating that the US government owns and controls Starshield and that any limits are decided by the military and the president.