Starbase, Texas, is now officially its own city, a big moment connected to Elon Musk’s SpaceX. On May 3, 2025, people in what used to be called Boca Chica, a small South Texas community near the Mexican border, voted strongly to become Starbase. Out of 283 eligible voters, 212 said yes and only 6 said no—a formality since most residents are SpaceX workers or their families.
Starbase covers about 1.5 square miles at Texas’s southern tip, where SpaceX has its headquarters and launch site for the Starship rocket, important for NASA and Department of Defense projects aiming for the moon and Mars. The area has prefab homes, Airstream trailers, and a golden bust of Elon Musk.
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Bobby Peden, SpaceX’s vice president of testing and launches, was elected mayor with no competition, getting 100% of early votes. Two other SpaceX employees, Jordan Buss and Jenna Petrzelka, were also chosen as city commissioners without any opponents.
SpaceX, led by General Manager Kathryn Lueders, supported the change to help “grow Starbase as a community,” handling its own roads, schools, and medical services. Being a city means Starbase can make its own rules, manage permits, collect taxes, and possibly set up police and fire departments.
Musk, who owns a home there and is registered to vote in Starbase (though he missed the early voting deadline), cheered the news on X, saying Starbase is “now a real city!” He first suggested the idea in 2021, tying it to his dream of a space-focused community, maybe even a step toward a future Martian colony.
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