The Breeding Ranch
Summary: Jeffrey Epstein reportedly pitched a “breeding ranch” in New Mexico—twenty women at a time carrying his children—an idea multiple scientists said he floated in the early 2000s [1]. There’s no evidence it happened. He already had mansions, Little Saint James, and, later, Great Saint James to stage his empire [3]. Elon Musk didn’t need the pitch—he’s living a very public pronatalist project: at least 14 children with multiple women, “legion-level” talk in private texts [4], and reported efforts to cluster family housing in Texas (which he has publicly denied) [5]. Different rhetoric—pseudoscience vs. techno-utopia—same self-myth. Dirty minds don’t need to meet; they echo across time.
Money warps incentives in predictable ways. Buy a social platform and, critics say, preside over spikes in hate speech and disinformation; multiple studies and newsrooms have documented significant increases on X since the takeover [7].
Epstein’s pitch: a New Mexico scheme where twenty women at a time would be impregnated at Zorro Ranch to “seed” humanity with his DNA—an ambition reported by the New York Times and widely summarized by major outlets; again, no evidence it occurred [1][2].
Epstein sold other people’s bodies. His fantasy was to glorify his own.
Two decades later, here’s Musk. In texts reported by the Wall Street Journal and summarized by other outlets, he spoke of aiming for a “legion-level” of children “before the apocalypse” and suggested using surrogates to accelerate births [4][8].
The press calls these “parallels.” That’s generous. Power plus adulation tends to converge on control.
Epstein wrapped his dream in futurist jargon and transhumanist talk; Musk frames his in collapsing-birth-rate rhetoric, memes, and product launches. Same instinct, different microphone [1].
What makes Musk’s version more consequential is scale and position. He builds rockets and cars and runs a social network that shapes information flows, including around elections; his personal pronatalism rides alongside real infrastructure. He doesn’t need to convince people he’s a genius; the world has already handed him that certificate—though they may yet withdraw it.
Here’s the part people whisper about: his platforms and alliances amplify illiberal currents. At minimum, he has used X to rally his base—including with DOGE-laced memes [6]—and critics argue the net effect mainstreams autocratic rhetoric [7].
Little Saint James, the crime scene. Great Saint James, the expansion plan. Paradise as cover for predation.
Epstein didn’t stop with mansions. He owned Little Saint James, long documented as a hub of abuse, and later bought the larger neighboring Great Saint James [3]. In New Mexico he built out Zorro Ranch—about 10,000 acres with a large main house and an airstrip (reports also reference an antique railcar on tracks). The ranch was very real; the “breeding center” remained a reported intention, never realized [2].
Musk’s Texas footprint is different. Separate from his Bastrop-County “Snailbrook” employee-adjacent community plans reported in 2023, multiple outlets reported in late 2024 that he assembled adjacent homes in Austin as a de-facto family compound; Musk publicly denied building any “secret compound.” Both facts belong in the record [5].
Another parallel: secrecy and contracts. Reporting describes NDAs and sizable financial offers tied to privacy with some mothers of Musk’s children; details surfaced in the same Wall Street Journal package that quoted the “legion-level” texts [8]. Musk has criticized the coverage.
History tells us what happens when powerful men treat reproduction as legacy engineering. The script is familiar: superiority asserted, bodies instrumentalized, harm discounted.
Epstein ran out of time; his New Mexico blueprint never became the breeding factory he boasted about. Musk is still in motion: the children exist; the ideology is public; the microphone is loud.
The bigger danger isn’t outbreeding anyone; it’s cultural drift. Every headline about a “legion,” every unchallenged quip about multiplying “better DNA,” nudges the Overton window. If billionaires can float repopulating the species with themselves, what can’t they float?
Dirty minds think alike.
Appendix: Sources
- The New York Times, Epstein Hoped to Seed Human Race With His DNA (July 31, 2019).
- Vanity Fair, Inside Jeffrey Epstein’s Decades-Long Relationship With His Biggest Client (June 2021); Associated Press/KOAT, Inside Epstein’s Zorro Ranch in New Mexico (2019).
- CNBC, Jeffrey Epstein’s Private Islands in the Virgin Islands (2019); The Guardian, Epstein Bought Great St. James Despite Legal Issues (Aug 2019).
- Wall Street Journal, Inside Elon Musk’s Secretive Efforts to Have More Children (Sept 2022).
- Page Six, Elon Musk buys $35M Texas compound (Oct 2024); Chron.com, Elon Musk builds a family compound near Austin (Nov 2024); Wikipedia, Snailbrook, Texas; Business Insider, Musk denies building a family compound (2024).
- Bloomberg, Musk and Dogecoin: How Memes Move Markets (2021).
- Center for Countering Digital Hate, Twitter Fails to Act on 99% of Hate Speech (Dec 2022); The Washington Post, Musk’s Twitter amplifies disinformation, research shows (2023); CBS News, Studies find hate speech surged after Musk takeover (2022–23).
Wall Street Journal, Inside Elon Musk’s Secretive Efforts to Have More Children (Sept 2022).
