Tracking Elon Musk’s Politics and Power
Justin Hendrix, Prithvi Iyer / Nov 26, 2024This tracker was first published on August 11, 2024, and is updated intermittently.
Elon Musk photographed at the Miami Grand Prix in May 2023. Cristiano Barni/Shutterstock
Elon Musk, currently the world’s richest person with a combined wealth of more than $220 billion, controls multiple companies, including SpaceX, The Boring Company, Tesla, xAI, and the social media platform X, formerly Twitter. But in recent years, he has also been called a far-right activist and a threat to democracy. He has used his ownership of X to engage in various political scuffles around the world, from Brazil to Australia, and launched various lawsuits intended to silence his critics.
In the 2024 US presidential election, he endorsed Donald Trump and supported a political action committee that was key to his re-election. He is deeply involved in transition planning and appointments, and the President-elect Trump appointed him to help lead a "Department of Government Efficiency," an advisory group that will work with the White House and Congress to reduce the size of the federal government.
Given Musk’s significant influence, vast financial resources, and influential role in the incoming Trump administration, Tech Policy Press is tracking key stories and developments related to his involvement in politics and elections, with a keen interest in phenomena related to his ownership of X. Hopefully, the tracker is a useful resource to those considering public policy questions at the intersection of technology and democracy.
This tracker starts at the date of Musk’s endorsement of President-elect Trump, and will be updated regularly.
November 25, 2024
Elon Musk and the age of shameless oligarchy
“Musk isn’t the only vocally partisan conservative billionaire donor today, though — there are also figures like hedge fund manager Bill Ackman and crypto investors Tyler and Cameron Winklevoss who have no qualms about sharing their politics online — but he is the most emblematic of this shift. Musk isn’t just Trump’s financial backer and the media mogul behind an increasingly instrumental arm of right-wing messaging — he’s an influencer with a following that most politicians running for office probably wish they commanded.”
-Whizy Kim, Vox
Elon Musk floats buying MSNBC, but he’s not the only billionaire who may be interested
“I spent Sunday on the phone with sources to gauge what might be going on. I learned that more than one benevolent billionaire with liberal bonafides has already reached out to acquaintances at MSNBC to express interest in buying the cable channel. The inbound interest was reassuring, one of the sources said, since it showed that oppositional figures like Musk (who famously bought Twitter to blow it up) would not be the only potential suitors.”
-Brian Stelter, CNN Business
November 24, 2024
Musk and Ramaswamy race to build a ‘DOGE’ team for war with Washington
“Tapped by President-elect Donald Trump to lead an advisory panel to find “drastic” cuts to the federal government, the billionaire “DOGE” leaders have spent the past week in Washington and at Mar-a-Lago, seeking staff and interviewing seasoned Washington operators, legal specialists and top tech leaders, according to five people familiar with the matter, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to reflect private deliberations.”
-Elizabeth Dwoskin, Jeff Stein, Jacob Bogage and Faiz Siddiqui, The Washington Post
What the Broligarchs Want From Trump
“After Donald Trump won this month’s election, one of the first things he did was to name two unelected male plutocrats, Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, to run a new Department of Government Efficiency. The yet-to-be-created entity’s acronym, DOGE, is something of a joke—a reference to a cryptocurrency named for an internet meme involving a Shiba Inu. But its appointed task of reorganizing the federal bureaucracy and slashing its spending heralds a new political arrangement in Washington: a broligarchy, in which tremendous power is flowing to tech and finance magnates, some of whom appear indifferent or even overtly hostile to democratic tradition.”
-Brooke Harrington, The Atlantic
Elon Musk has never been richer. He’s now worth nearly $350 billion
“The richest person in the world got even richer Friday, with Musk’s net worth hitting a record $347.8 billion, Bloomberg reported. That beats his previous record set in November 2021, when the Tesla founder’s net worth exceeded $340 billion, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index.”
-Ramishah Maruf, CNN
Musk Unleashes Online Army on Federal Workers. ‘A Tough Way to Find Out She’s Losing Her Job.’
“As Trump efficiency czar, the billionaire is targeting employees by name on X—sparking pushback.”
-Jim Carlton and Rebecca Ballhaus, The Wall Street Journal
Elon Musk is directing harassment toward individual federal workers
“Elon Musk is, in addition to many other things, now the co-lead of the currently nonexistent Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) advisory group. Now, before it even gets rolling, he has begun singling out individual government employees he says are emblematic of the government’s bloat and posting about them to his hundreds of millions of followers on X.”
-Jay Peters, The Verge
What Elon Musk Needs From China
“Mr. Musk has a lot on the line. His best-known company, the electric vehicle maker Tesla, makes half its cars in China. Tesla sells more cars in China than anywhere except the United States, and his local competition is getting stronger. Chinese regulators have not yet allowed Tesla to offer its latest assisted-driving and self-driving car technology, while allowing Chinese automakers to race ahead with similar systems.”
-Keith Bradsher, The New York Times
Elon Musk Gets a Crash Course in How Trumpworld Works
“And so Mr. Musk, more than any other key player in the presidential transition, finds himself in a cram session to learn the courtier politics of Mr. Trump’s inner circle. For the world’s richest person — not known for his humility or patience — it is a social engineering challenge far trickier and less familiar than heavy manufacturing or rocket science.”
-Theodore Schleifer, The New York Times
November 21, 2024
“Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., has been tapped to lead a new House subcommittee that will work with the so-called Department of Government Efficiency led by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy. Greene and House Oversight Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., have met with Ramaswamy and his team and are ‘already working together,’ a source familiar with the matter told CNBC on Thursday. Comer aims to establish the subpanel early next year, the source said.”
-Kevin Breuninger, NBC News
Elon Musk’s transformation, in his own words
"To his followers Mr Musk advocates a fierce focus on missions he sees as urgent, such as making humans an 'interplanetary species' by colonising Mars. But his own posts reveal shifting interests over the past few years, with the only truly intense focus on the act of posting itself. He may have more money than anyone else on Earth and the ear of the next president, but to a casual observer, he may not seem that different from any other American man in his 50s: lurching rightward politically, online a huge share of the time, complaining about immigration and mocking the left."
-The Economist
Elon Musk just reignited his feud with Jeff Bezos
“Elon Musk has taken aim at Jeff Bezos once more, reigniting the war of words between two of the world's richest people. In an X post on Thursday, Musk said Bezos had told people to dump their shares in his companies because Donald Trump was bound to lose the presidential election. Hours later, Bezos replied that the claim was ‘100% not true.’”
-Theron Mohamed, Business Insider
November 20, 2024
Republicans Were Ready to Torch Elon Musk for Blowing the Election. Then Trump Won
“In fact, in the weeks leading up to Election Day, a number of these sources — including one senior Trump campaign official — said they were each willing to go on the record with Rolling Stone about how furious they were at Musk and his America PAC operation for comically botching the Trump ground game in the battleground states, thus blowing the presidential race for Trump. The catch was: These sources were only willing to vent, with their names attached, if Trump actually lost. And some of these Republicans were indeed anxious that he would.”
-Miles Klee and Asawin Suebsaeng, Rolling Stone
MPs to summon Elon Musk to testify about X’s role in UK summer riots
“MPs are to summon Elon Musk to testify about X’s role in spreading disinformation, in a parliamentary inquiry into the UK riots and the rise of false and harmful AI content, the Guardian has learned. Senior executives from Meta, which runs Facebook and Instagram, and TikTok are also expected to be called for questioning as part of a Commons science and technology select committee social media inquiry.”
-Robert Booth and Jessica Elgot, The Guardian
November 19, 2024
As Elon Musk Moved to the Right, His Businesses Moved to Texas
“Elon Musk had long been drifting away from the political culture of California, railing against its regulations and pandemic-era lockdowns. So, four years ago, he decided to move to Texas, eager to embrace its wide-open business culture and be embraced by its Republican leaders. Since then, Mr. Musk and his companies have spread across Texas with accelerating speed, transforming ranches into factories outside of Austin, using coastal lands as a launch site for space travel near Brownsville and turning farms outside Corpus Christi into what will soon be the state’s first lithium refinery, for his electric cars.”
-J. David Goodman, The New York Times
November 18, 2024
Trump to join Musk at SpaceX launch in Texas - Live Updates
“Donald Trump plans to accompany billionaire Elon Musk to a SpaceX launch in Texas on Tuesday, according to a person familiar with the president-elect's plans. Musk, who emerged as a top donor and Trump surrogate during the 2024 election, has been an influential person in Trump's orbit since the election.”
-Meredith McGraw, Politico
Elon Musk’s Political Influence
“Over the course of the 2024 presidential campaign, Elon Musk went from dark-money donor to high-profile surrogate to unofficial chief of staff. He camped out at Mar-a-Lago after the election with the Trump family and hopped on Donald Trump’s call with Ukraine’s president. He’s even played diplomat, meeting secretly in New York with Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations. Last week, the president-elect named Musk to co-lead a department focused on government efficiency, a role that will put him in a position to recommend the hiring and firing of federal workers and the restructuring of entire agencies. But it’s clear that Musk’s influence could reach far beyond even this.”
-Jonathan Mahler, The New York Times
November 17, 2024
Trump’s Election Is Also a Win for Tech’s Right-Wing “Warrior Class”
“During his last term, the U.S. tech sector tiptoed skittishly around Trump; longtime right-winger Peter Thiel stood as an outlier in his full-throated support of MAGA politics as other investors and executives largely winced and smiled politely. Back then, Silicon Valley still offered the public peaceful mission statements of improving the human condition, connecting people, and organizing information. Technology was supposed to help, never harm. No more: People like Thiel, Palmer Luckey, Trae Stephens, and Marc Andreessen make up a new vanguard of powerful tech figures who have unapologetically merged right-wing politics with a determination to furnish a MAGA-dominated United States with a constant flow of newer, better arms and surveillance tools.”
-Sam Biddle, The Intercept
Election Reveals Right-Wing Shift of Social Media Platforms
“After Donald J. Trump won the election this month, his supporters gravitated to a panoply of online destinations to celebrate. Hundreds of thousands of posts lauding Mr. Trump’s victory filled Truth Social, the social platform that the president-elect owns. Speculation about what the new administration would accomplish ran rampant on X, which is owned by Elon Musk. Gab, Parler and other right-wing social media sites were flooded with thousands of memes glorifying Mr. Trump. No similar spaces existed for the left. Meta’s Instagram, Threads and Facebook had publicly de-emphasized politics leading up to the election. Mr. Musk had transformed Twitter into X and shifted it to the right. And no other tech platform had gained momentum as a public square for liberals.”
-Sheera Frenkel, The New York Times
November 16, 2024
Musk appears to pressure Trump on Cabinet and tariffs, raising eyebrows
“In a Saturday morning post on X, the social network he owns and runs, Musk praised a foreign leader’s decision to cut tariffs — the same import taxes that Trump wants to raise to the highest level in a century. Several hours later, Musk posted that Howard Lutnick, Trump’s co-transition chair, would be a better choice than hedge fund executive Scott Bessent for treasury secretary.”
-Jacqueline Alemany, Jeff Stein and Maegan Vazquez, The Washington Post
Elon Musk's X Corp. files notice in Alex Jones' Infowars bankruptcy case
“Attorneys for X Corp., the firm established by Elon Musk to take over Twitter, filed a notice of appearance on Thursday in the bankruptcy case of Alex Jones and his Infowars platform.The new owners of satirical news site The Onion had been declared the successful bidders for Jones’ controversial platform, alongside families of the Sandy Hook massacre victims.”
-Rob Wile, NBC News
November 15, 2024
Musk has long history of squabbles, investigations with federal agencies
“Elon Musk had a lot riding on the 2024 presidential election. The Tesla and SpaceX CEO, who poured more than $118 million into a pro-Trump political action committee he launched, has had years of interactions with the federal government. SpaceX has amassed billions of dollars in federal contracts, including deals worth about $4 billion with NASA to put humans on the moon. Meanwhile, Musk has faced significant federal regulatory scrutiny as owner or chief executive of the various companies he leads.”
-Faiz Siddiqui and Rachel Lerman, The Washington Post
Elon Musk's X sues California over AI law targeting deepfakes, deceptive election content
“Elon Musk's social media platform X is suing California over a new state law targeting deceptive, AI-generated election content, claiming that it violates First Amendment free speech protections. Known as the Defending Democracy From Deepfake Deception Act of 2024, the law requires social media companies to block and remove ‘materially deceptive’ content related to elections and candidates beginning 120 days before an election in California, as well as 60 days after an election if the content pertains to election officials.”
-Carlos Castañeda, CBS News
Musk asks ‘high-IQ revolutionaries’ to work for Trump project without pay
“Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy, who were appointed by Trump to lead an initiative to slash government spending, issued a statement on Thursday on X, formerly Twitter. At first glance, it seemed to be a job posting to help restructure federal agencies and cut regulations and waste. Instead, it was a call for volunteers.”
-Rachel Barber, USA Today
Russians focus on Musk as they assess incoming Trump administration
“As US President-elect Donald Trump continues to make heads turn with nominations for key roles in his incoming administration, Russians are trying to understand the appointments and what impacts they might have for Moscow. Russian state TV has spent the last few days using their slickly produced talk shows to tell the Russian people what they should make of the incoming administration – in particular what it might mean for Russians and the war in Ukraine.”
-Sebastian Shukla, CNN
November 14, 2024
Elon Musk says he and Trump have 'mandate to delete' regulations. Ethics laws could limit Musk role
“In picking billionaire Elon Musk to be 'our cost cutter' for the U.S. government, President-elect Donald Trump won’t be the first American president to empower a business tycoon to look for ways to dramatically cut federal regulations.President Ronald Reagan tapped J. Peter Grace to lead a bureaucratic cost-cutting commission in 1982. Still, the chemical business magnate had fewer conflicts of interest than the world’s richest man does today.”
-Matt O’Brien and Tom Krisher, The Associated Press
“Elon Musk might be in charge of the business of Grok, but the artificial intelligence has seemingly gone into business for itself, labeling Musk as one of the worst offenders when it comes to spreading misinformation online. User Gary Koepnick asked the AI which person spreads the most misinformation on Twitter/X—and the service did not hesitate in pointing a finger at its creator. ‘Based on various analyses, social media sentiment, and reports, Elon Musk has been identified as one of the most significant spreaders of misinformation on X since he acquired the platform,’ it wrote, later adding ‘Musk has made numerous posts that have been criticized for promoting or endorsing misinformation, especially related to political events, elections, health issues like COVID-19, and conspiracy theories. His endorsements or interactions with content from controversial figures or accounts with a history of spreading misinformation have also contributed to this perception.’”
-Chris Morris, Fortune
How Trump ‘first buddy’ Elon Musk fell out with the UK
“Yet Musk’s rise in U.S. politics has coincided with his growing hostility toward Starmer, Britain’s center-left leader. The tech giant zeroed in on wide-scale rioting that hit the U.K. in August, raging over a crackdown on inflammatory social media posts associated with the disorder and accusing the U.K. of ‘two-tier’ policing — claiming that British police deal less harshly with violence perpetrated by non-white offenders.”
-Esther Webber and Dan Bloom, Politico
Musk and Ramaswamy won't be paid to lead new Department of Government Efficiency, Musk says
“Elon Musk said he and Vivek Ramaswamy will not be paid for leading the newly-created Department of Government Efficiency. Musk, the Tesla CEO and SpaceX founder, and Ramaswamy, an entrepreneur and former Republican presidential candidate, were appointed to lead the new department, deemed DOGE for short, by President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday."
-Greta Cross, USA Today
Elon Musk Met With Iran’s U.N. Ambassador, Iranian Officials Say
“Elon Musk, a close adviser to President-elect Donald J. Trump, met with Iran’s ambassador to the United Nations on Monday in New York in a session that two Iranian officials described as a discussion of how to defuse tensions between Iran and the United States.”
-Farnaz Fassihi, The New York Times
November 13, 2024
At Mar-a-Lago, ‘Uncle’ Elon Musk Puts His Imprint on the Trump Transition
“Behind the scenes, Mr. Musk’s behavior has been far more hands-on than even some of his allies expected. His role, in the eyes of some Trump aides, even outstrips that of Howard Lutnick and Linda E. McMahon, the two formally appointed leaders of the Trump transition. He has sat in on calls with foreign leaders, including President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey and President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, and plans to meet in person this week with President Javier Milei of Argentina when Mr. Milei visits Mar-a-Lago. Mr. Musk has also attended at least one national security meeting with Mr. Trump alongside the likes of Stephen Miller, a top aide, and Donald Trump Jr., according to a person briefed on the meeting. On Wednesday, Mr. Musk is expected to accompany Mr. Trump to a meeting with House Republicans on Capitol Hill, according to a person close to the president-elect. Mr. Musk is flying aboard Mr. Trump’s plane to Washington, the person said.”
-Theodore Schleifer, The New York Times
Advertisers set to return to X as they seek favor with Elon Musk and Donald Trump
“Elon Musk’s support for Donald Trump is set to boost X’s flagging business, with some marketers poised for a return to the social media platform in order to seek favor with the incoming administration. Media executives told the Financial Times that some brands were preparing to advertise on X once again, as its billionaire owner was likely to gain an influential role within a second Trump White House.”
-Hannah Murphy, Daniel Thomas, Eric Platt, The Financial Times
5 things to know about EU tech security chief Henna Virkkunen’s hearing
“Virkkunen left the hearing with one name echoing in her ears: Elon Musk. She was asked time and again whether she would stand firm in the face of U.S. pressure to not challenge the owner of X, the social media platform facing the EU’s first regulatory probe under its new social media law, the Digital Services Act (DSA)... Virkkunen on Tuesday took a quintessential Brussels approach to the issue, sticking to her script and spelling out the same, legalistic answer all evening: Any company operating in Europe must abide by its rules. She said she wanted to speed up the investigations under the DSA, but the work needed to be ‘evidence-based.’ She stopped short of any comment on how Musk has failed to stop misinformation and harmful content from spreading on X — a big contrast with incumbent EU Commission Vice President Věra Jourová, who called Musk a ‘promoter of evil’ only a month ago and told POLITICO he ‘is not able to recognize good and evil.’”
-Laurens Cerulus, Pieter Haeck, Mathieu Pollet and Sam Clark, Politico Europe
Trump Announces Elon Musk Will Lead "Department of Government Efficiency"
“Billionaire tech entrepreneur Elon Musk, who spent more than $200 million in his bid to help re-elect Donald Trump, will help lead an initiative called the ‘Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE),’ according to a statement from the President-elect.”
-Justin Hendrix, Tech Policy Press
November 12, 2024
TechScape: Will Elon Musk fire a third of the US government?
“Trump, president-elect of the US, said he wants to appoint Musk, the world’s richest man, as the country’s ‘secretary of cost-cutting’ to reduce bureaucracy in the federal government by an order of $2tn, roughly a third. Trump announced in September that he would create a ‘Department of Government Efficiency.’ Musk had pushed for the idea and has since relentlessly promoted it, emphasizing the acronym for the agency: Doge, a reference to a meme of an expressive Shiba Inu. Trump said the agency will be conducting a ‘complete financial and performance audit of the entire federal government, and making recommendations for drastic reforms.’”
-Blake Montgomery, The Guardian
Elon Musk wants to radically reshape who controls America’s money supply
“President-elect Donald Trump’s return to the White House already carried the potential for sweeping changes to the Federal Reserve. But now a growing question is not how the central bank will operate under Trump but if it’ll continue to operate at all. Elon Musk, a key Trump backer who is expected to have considerable sway in helping shape Trump’s policies, included a ‘100’ emoji while resharing Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah’s post on X calling for abolishing the Fed.”
-Elisabeth Buchwald, CNN Business
Behind the Curtain: The Trump, Musk fusion
“This Trump-Musk fusion seems to grow stronger by the day. The two are working together to shape the new White House, the new Senate and the new Cabinet, plus future foreign relations and governing blueprints. The pair plots and plans at Trump's Mar-a-Lago, where Musk is often camped out. He's one of only a couple of confidants who attends Cabinet-selection sessions in Trump's makeshift Situation Room. The two amplify their thinking and desires on Musk's X.”
-Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei, Axios
November 11, 2024
Elon Musk and the PayPal Mafia are now Trump’s techno-libertarian dream team
“In the weeks after Donald Trump’s 2016 victory, many top tech leaders found themselves at a meeting in Trump Tower, frowning and quite obviously full of dread. Now, the same executives sound enthusiastic when they say they’re looking forward to working with the next president. After Tuesday’s election, the congratulations from the tech elite to Trump came in fast. The day after he secured the White House, everyone from Tim Cook to Mark Zuckerberg posted their well wishes for Trump’s second term. Even Jeff Bezos weighed in, hailing Trump’s ‘extraordinary political comeback and decisive victory.’ This, from a man who has been in more than one public feud with Trump.”
-Adam Clark Estes, Vox
The push for Elon Musk to lead American AI policy is already starting
“Efforts to influence President-elect Donald Trump’s policies via Elon Musk are already beginning. On Friday, nonprofit AI advocacy group Americans for Responsible Innovation (ARI) launched a public petition asking Trump to make Musk his special adviser on AI, saying he is well positioned to protect the US lead on the technology while ensuring it’s rolled out safely.”
-Lauren Feiner, The Verge
Elon Musk is no Kissinger, but may help improve U.S.-China relations, experts say
“Elon Musk’s relationship with Donald Trump has fueled expectations that he could soften the U.S. President-elect’s policy stance toward Beijing, but experts caution against putting too much stock into the Tesla CEO.”
-Dylan Butts and Evelyn Cheng, CNBC
Trump could tip the scales in Elon Musk's secret battle against DOJ
“For nearly a year, Elon Musk’s X Corp. has been waging a secret courtroom battle to weaken a potent and increasingly common tactic employed by the Justice Department: legal gag orders that prohibit social media companies from telling users when prosecutors demand access to their accounts.So far, the fight over these ‘nondisclosure orders’ has been a losing battle for the company — most emphatically in a failed bid to protect President-elect Donald Trump’s account from the prying eyes of special counsel Jack Smith. But now Musk is arguably one of the most influential advisers to Trump, who is about to take over the Justice Department and plans to radically change the way it operates.”
-Kyle Cheney, Josh Gerstein and Alfred NG, Politico
November 10, 2024
Elon Musk’s “Election Integrity Community” Turns Its Attention to Arizona
“Members of Elon Musk’s so-called ‘Election Integrity Community’ have turned their attention from stoking paranoia about voter fraud in the presidential race, now that Trump won, to alleging it in Arizona, where a closely watched Senate race looks like it could result in a GOP loss.As of early Sunday, major news outlets had yet to call the race between Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) and Republican candidate Kari Lake, though Gallego was leading with an estimated 88 percent of ballots counted. But in the ‘Election Integrity Community’ on X—billed as a space for its 65,000 members to ‘share potential incidents of voter fraud or irregularities you see while voting in the 2024 election,’ and backed by Musk’s pro-Trump PAC—such a close race, and potentially a GOP loss, can mean only one thing: The election was stolen.”
-Julianne McShane, Mother Jones
Senators Vying to Be G.O.P. Leader Vow to Quickly Confirm Trump Nominees
“Senators vying to become the next leader of the Republican conference pledged on Sunday to quickly push through President-elect Donald J. Trump’s appointees after he demanded on social media that they do so. Senator Rick Scott of Florida was the first to make such a vow in an attempt to curry favor with Mr. Trump. Mr. Scott quickly picked up the endorsement of one of the president-elect’s biggest backers, the billionaire Elon Musk.”
-Luke Broadwater, The New York Times
For legal disputes, Elon Musk’s X picked a venue far from Texas HQ
“But under X’s new terms of service, which take effect Nov. 15, lawsuits against the social media platform must be filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas — not the Western District of Texas, where the company is headquartered.”
-Tobi Raji, The Washington Post
November 9, 2024
Elon Musk Is Positioning X Behind the New Trump Presidency
“Since Donald J. Trump won the presidential election, Elon Musk has gone all in on X to promote the incoming administration. Mr. Musk, who owns X, posted on the platform about politics more than 400 times between Tuesday and Friday, celebrating Mr. Trump’s victory and talking about the causes that the president-elect should take up in office. Mr. Musk’s posts included a photo of himself and his son X Æ A-Xii Musk surrounded by Mr. Trump and his family at Mar-a-Lago, as well as another photo of himself with Mr. Trump that was captioned 'Novus Ordo Seclorum,' a Latin phrase that appears on the dollar bill and means ‘a new order for the ages.’ Linda Yaccarino, X’s chief executive, also chimed in. In reply to a post this week about the platform’s role in driving political conversation, she wrote, ‘Reporting for duty.’”
-Kate Conger and Sheera Frenkel, The New York Times
November 8, 2024
Elon Musk Net Worth Tops $300 Billion
"Elon Musk’s net worth has surpassed $300 billion for the first time in almost three years, as shares of Tesla Inc. soar on bets that his close ties with President-elect Donald Trump will bolster the company. Musk has added more to his personal fortune since Trump’s win than anyone else tracked by the Bloomberg Billionaire’s Index.”
-Dylan Sloan, Bloomberg
How tech leaders tied to Musk hope to steer the Trump administration
“Elon Musk’s ascension as a ‘new star’ in Trump’s orbit has given a crop of Silicon Valley players deep access to the creation of the new administration, leaving them optimistic that they are positioned to impose a start-up ethos on Washington and bring sometimes-radical policy ideas to life.”
-Elizabeth Dwoskin, The Washington Post
Scoop: Elon Musk joined Trump's call with Zelensky
“Donald Trump's phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Wednesday included two surprises: Elon Musk was also on the line, and Zelensky was somewhat reassured by what he heard from the president-elect, two sources with knowledge of the call tell Axios. Why it matters: The new details of the call underscore how influential Musk could be in the second Trump administration, and the uncertainty over how exactly Trump will approach Ukraine.”
-Barak Ravid, Axios
November 7, 2024
The growing danger of Elon Musk’s misinformation machine
“Elon Musk spent Election Day on X praising men, amplifying anti-immigrant conspiracies, and accusing Democrats of voter fraud. It was all pretty on-brand for the billionaire, who has become one of Donald Trump’s biggest supporters and a one-man misinformation machine. When it was clear early Wednesday morning that Trump would win the presidency, Musk told his followers: ‘You are the media now.’”
-Adam Clark Estes, Vox
How Elon Musk stands to cash in on Trump's presidential victory
“Musk’s investment in Trump is already paying off, even though Trump doesn’t take office until Jan. 20. Tesla shares soared 15% on Wednesday, adding roughly $15 billion in paper value to Musk’s net worth. The electric vehicle maker faces headwinds in the global market from China-based competitors, declining European sales and consumers’ growing distaste for his political views.”
-Lora Kolodny, CNBC
Trump-Musk Partnership Puts New Spin on Value of X
“But the general belief that Musk was fleeced when he bought Twitter, now X, was flipped on its head this week thanks to Trump’s win. The US election highlighted a stark reality that has existed for X since well before Musk ever arrived on the scene: The social network’s value is almost impossible to measure because the product’s impact on culture and politics is significantly more meaningful than the size of its business.”
-Kurt Wagner, Bloomberg
Elon Musk's Twitter takeover math has changed
“Elon Musk overpaid for Twitter when he bought it for $44 billion in late 2022, after unsuccessfully trying to renegotiate or renege. Now a new conventional wisdom is emerging: Twitter is a loss leader for the rest of Elon Inc. The argument is that Musk bought Twitter for power, not profit. And that the gamble paid off.”
-Dan Primack, Axios
Did Elon Musk Win the Election for Donald Trump
Vittoria Elliott: “One thing Musk does with his talk of space travel and electric cars, is make the future sound exciting, in a way that I think is appealing to people. So, that was definitely the vibe that I got from people in Butler, that they were excited that he was there, they were excited about his ideas. Again, that they felt it lent their candidate a lot of legitimacy to have someone so smart and so accomplished siding with him.”
-Leag Feiger, Wired
November 6, 2024
Elon Musk wins big by betting on Trump
“‘A star is born: Elon,’ said Donald Trump in a lengthy shout out to his biggest donor while claiming victory in the US presidential race on Wednesday morning. Trump’s win ushers in a new era for Musk — already the world’s richest person with a $260bn fortune — whose gamble on a knife-edge US election paid off as he is set to become one of the president’s most influential political and business advisers. Musk’s promised role as head of a new Department of Government Efficiency will give the billionaire sweeping powers to recommend deep cuts to what he deems a “vast federal bureaucracy . . . holding America back in a big way”. Musk has also vowed to champion deregulation and will gain influence over US policy on artificial intelligence, space exploration and electric vehicles — all sectors that he has a personal stake in through his leadership of xAI, SpaceX and Tesla. ‘He’s a character, he’s a special guy, he’s a super-genius,’ Trump said of Musk on Wednesday. ‘We have to protect our geniuses, we don’t have that many of them.’”
-Stephen Morris and Hannah Murphy, The Financial Times
Elon Musk wins big by betting on Trump
"The role could give Musk influence over agencies he has long lamented, such as the Securities and Exchange Commission, which is investigating his 2022 acquisition of Twitter, now called X, and sued him in 2018 over a tweet in which he claimed he had the funding to take Tesla private. At a recent rally in Pittsburgh, Musk said he had discovered there were 428 federal government agencies. "What the hell do you need 428 agencies for? Why do you even need 100? This is crazy," he said. During a town hall in Pennsylvania on October 18, he suggested laying off federal employees."
-Ana Altchek, Business Insider
Trump’s Victory Is a Major Win for Elon Musk and Big-Money Politics
“Mr. Musk almost single-handedly funded an effort that cost more than $175 million. His canvassers knocked on close to 11 million doors in presidential battleground states since August, including about 1.8 million in Michigan and 2.3 million in Pennsylvania, according to people with knowledge of the matter. Another $30 million was spent on a large direct-mail program, and about $22 million on digital advertising, including on Trump-friendly mediums like Barstool Sports."
-Theodore Schleifer and Susanne Craig, The New York Times
November 5, 2024
Elon Musk’s Twitter Takeover Set Off a Race to the Bottom
“But for years, public pressure from government officials, civil society, and the media pushed tech companies to invest in teams and tools that could at least somewhat address issues of hate speech or misinformation on their platforms, so they could say they were making a good-faith effort to deal with the issue. Musk’s purchase of Twitter signaled a change, according to six former trust and safety employees from Twitter and Meta. When Musk took over Twitter in October 2022, he quickly fired more than 50 percent of the company’s workers, including almost all of the company’s trust and safety and policy staff—the people tasked with creating and enforcing the platform’s policies around things like hate speech, violent content, conspiracy theories, and mis- and disinformation. Since then, Meta, Google, Amazon, and Discord have all made cuts to trust and safety staff.”
-Vittoria Elliott, Wired
Elon Musk could be the biggest winner of a second Trump term
Tech billionaire Elon Musk and his business empire stand to reap massive rewards if former President Donald Trump returns to the White House. But Musk, who has turned X into a pro-Trump echo chamber, will have unparalleled conflicts of interest if he becomes a government efficiency czar. The potential benefits for Musk and his companies are wide-ranging: possibly touching regulatory issues like labor laws and environmental protections, lower tax rates and the chance for more government contracts for Musk’s rocket company, SpaceX.
-David Ingram, Dan De Luce and Laura Strickler, NBC News
What Elon Musk Told His 203 Million X Followers on Election Day
“On Election Day, Elon Musk used his X account to encourage his 203 million followers to vote for Donald J. Trump. He also used it to stoke fears about election interference… Mr. Musk told listeners he might announce the results on X with Mr. Trump on Tuesday night, 'if the votes are clear enough that there is victory.'"
-Kate Conger, The New York Times
Musk to Spend Election Night With Trump
“Elon Musk plans to spend election night with former President Donald J. Trump, giving Mr. Trump direct access to the person controlling one of key information platforms on what could be a chaotic evening. Mr. Musk, according to three people with knowledge of his schedule, plans to be at Mar-a-Lago for some of the evening festivities in Palm Beach, Fla. He will be among a small group watching the returns with Mr. Trump as they come in, according to two people with knowledge of the plan.”
-Theodore Schleifer and Maggie Haberman, The New York Times
“When Musk announced his intent to purchase Twitter, in April 2022, the New York Times columnist Ezra Klein aptly noted that ‘Musk reveals what he wants Twitter to be by how he acts on it.’ By this logic, it would seem that X is vying to be the official propaganda outlet not just for Trump generally but also for the ‘Great Replacement’ theory, which states that there is a global plot to eradicate the white race and its culture through immigration. In just the past year, Musk has endorsed multiple posts about the conspiracy theory. In November 2023, in response to a user named @breakingbaht who accused Jews of supporting bringing ‘hordes of minorities’ into the United States, Musk replied, ‘You have said the actual truth.’ Musk’s post was viewed more than 8 million times.”
-Charlie Warzel, The Atlantic
Elon Musk promotes video referencing QAnon in support of Trump
"Elon Musk shared a video in support of Donald Trump that appeared to include references to the extremist QAnon ideology and footage from the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol, elevating the radicalized movement on the evening before millions of American voters cast their ballots on Election Day."
-Leo Sands, The Washington Post
Joe Rogan endorses Donald Trump after interview with Elon Musk
“Joe Rogan endorses Donald Trump after interviewing Elon Musk, citing Musk's ‘compelling case’ for the former president's re-election.”
-USA Today
Alarm grows over Trump and Musk’s blizzard of baseless voter-fraud claims
"Donald Trump and top allies such as the multi-billionaire Elon Musk have created a blizzard of false voting misinformation portraying Democrats as bent on stealing the election, undermining trust in the voting process and leading to potential violence, voting experts and ex-federal prosecutors say."
-Peter Stone, The Guardian
Elon Musk Pushes ‘Ballot Curing’ in Pennsylvania, Eyeing Tight Margin
"Elon Musk’s super PAC has been emphasizing 'ballot curing' in the final days of the presidential campaign, a highly expensive strategy meant to pick up a few additional votes in a razor-thin election. Mr. Musk’s group, America PAC, has sent a new last-minute field team into the state of Pennsylvania, according to two people with knowledge of the move who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss it. One of the people said it was described to him as an 'emergency' squad. A spokesman for America PAC declined to comment."
-Theodore Schleifer, The New York Times
November 4, 2024
Elon Musk Steps Up Pro-Trump Posts on X
“Mr. Musk said on Monday that he would hold a ‘town hall’ on X that evening to discuss the election, using the company’s live audio chat feature. With over 202 million followers, Mr. Musk’s account is X’s most-followed, by a margin of more than 71 million, and his posts are some of the most broadly shared and viewed. Engagement with his posts — including likes and reposts — has doubled over the past year, according to X’s metrics.”
-Kate Conger, The New York Times
Elon Musk's influence over Trump is being closely watched by Beijing
“If Donald Trump is elected Tuesday, the former president has said he may be advised by tech billionaire Elon Musk, who has campaigned for him vigorously in recent weeks and donated more than $100 million to his campaign. That, perhaps more than the presidential race itself, is being closely watched here in China, where the world’s richest man has extensive business interests and the appearance of a tight relationship with Chinese officials.”
-Janis Mackey Frayer and Jennifer Jet, NBC News
Critical court decisions loom for Elon Musk as he straddles politics and business
“Elon Musk is facing consequential court rulings in the days and weeks ahead as one judge weighs the legality of his multimillion-dollar election sweepstakes while another decides if the Tesla (TSLA) CEO gets a $56 billion compensation package back. Musk is accustomed to doing business battles in court. But on Monday it was his recent foray into presidential politics on behalf of Republican candidate Donald Trump that had him on the defensive.”
-Alexis Keenan, Yahoo Finance
Elon Musk and His Super PAC Face Their Crucible Moment
“In the final hours of the presidential campaign, Mr. Musk, the world’s richest person, is under significant pressure to deliver voter turnout for former President Donald J. Trump, who has outsourced much of his on-the-ground effort to the Musk super PAC. Canvassers for America PAC, Mr. Musk’s group, have knocked on about 10 million doors, according to a person familiar with the figures. But the group has also drawn much scrutiny, including from some people inside Mr. Trump’s operation who worry about relying so heavily on an outside organization for get-out-the vote work.”
-Theodore Schleifer, The New York Times
“In the run up to the high-stakes 2024 presidential election, Elon Musk has posted a blizzard of false and misleading claims about the election on his social media platform that have generated more than 2 billion views this year, according to new analysis from a nonprofit that tracks misinformation. Musk, the billionaire X owner who endorsed former President Donald Trump in July, has emerged as a leading figure in US politics, in addition to his longstanding reputation as an enterprising science leader at Tesla and SpaceX. He has given more than $118 million to a pro-Trump super PAC and hit the campaign trail to stump for Trump in Pennsylvania.”
-Marshall Cohen, CNN
Judge rejects request to block Elon Musk $1 million voter giveaway
“A judge on Monday rejected a request by the Philadelphia District Attorney to block a $1 million daily giveaway by Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s political action committee to voters in registered voters in Pennsylvania and other swing states before Election Day. Philadelphia County Common Pleas Court Judge Angelo Foglietta’s order came after an hours-long hearing in which DA Larry Krasner testified that the giveaway by America PAC was a ‘scam,’ a ‘grift’ and an ‘illegal lottery.’”
-Gary Grumbach and Dan Mangan, CNBC
November 3, 2024
How Elon Musk’s Own Account Dominates X
"Days ahead of the presidential election, Elon Musk’s centrality to his social media platform, X, has become more pronounced. Mr. Musk has posted more than 3,000 times on the site in the last month, according to a tally by The New York Times, campaigning heavily for former President Donald J. Trump. The tech mogul has also shared dozens of unfounded claims about the election, including that votes will be rigged against his preferred candidate. All of his posts have traveled further and resounded more widely than ever as Mr. Musk’s X account has come to dominate the platform, effectively making him the host of his own social media site. His account is the most popular on X by a significant margin, with more than 202 million followers. It drives the platform’s daily conversation and nudges discussion to the right, according to independent research and an analysis by The Times. And engagement with his posts — including likes and reposts — has doubled over the past year, according to X’s metrics."
-Kate Conger, Aaron Krolik, Santul Nerkar, and Dylan Freedman, The New York Times
Why the Pentagon just can’t quit Elon Musk
“Generally speaking, the national security state frowns on its denizens having unauthorized contact with the leaders of America’s main global adversaries. That is just what Elon Musk has been doing, according to the Wall Street Journal, which reported that the Tesla, X, and SpaceX chief has been having undisclosed conversations with Vladimir Putin and other senior Russian officials since late 2022. These conversations reportedly included a request from the Russian leader to avoid turning on Musk’s Starlink satellite internet service over Taiwan as a favor to Chinese leader Xi Jinping. The Journal reported that Musk’s Kremlin contacts were a 'closely held secret' in government, and that even some White House officials had not been briefed on them, though there have been scattered reports in the media about them dating back to 2022.”
-Joshua Keating, Vox
November 2, 2024
In Elon Musk's "election integrity" community on X, false claims proliferate
“Elon Musk's political action committee has created a group on his platform X that has become a repository for election misinformation, galvanizing more than 58,000 members to report instances of ‘voter fraud or irregularities’ that are often unsubstantiated, misleading or flat-out fabricated. The ‘Election Integrity Community,’ which launched in late October, has hundreds of new posts each day, many of which contain misleading or false claims, CBS News found. Misinformation experts are concerned that mobilizing people to gather unverified claims of election fraud is fueling the spread of false narratives that undermine trust in election security.”
-Julia Ingram, CBS News
Trump Is Betting Big on Musk’s Swing-State Moonshot
“It is unusual for a candidate from a major political party to lean so heavily on a field operation that is funded and controlled by an outside organization. If Mr. Musk is seen as successful, he could usher in a new era when billionaires, who have no legal limit on their spending, dominate ground operations.”
-Theodore Schleifer, Mattathias Schwartz, and Susanne Craig, The New York Times
November 1, 2024
'All hell has broken loose': Inside Elon Musk's high-stakes pro-Trump door-knocking effort
“Nine Republican operatives and canvassers connected to the Elon Musk-backed America PAC told NBC News that they’re worried the high-profile grassroots operation on behalf of Donald Trump’s presidential bid may hamper his chances in states decided by slim margins. America PAC has been tasked with much of the pro-Trump canvassing operation as his campaign focuses its efforts on a more limited effort targeting so-called low-propensity voters. In turn, the Musk-backed organization is going door to door in all of the major swing states to help turn out Trump supporters and have them fill out surveys about their voting intentions.”
-Allan Smith, NBC News
America Pac was warned about Trump ground game fraud months ago
“America Pac, the political action committee founded by Elon Musk that has led the ground game operation for Donald Trump’s campaign, was warned in September about increasing numbers of door knocks being flagged as potentially fraudulent, according to three people familiar with the matter.”
-Hugo Lowell, The Guardian
Musk Gave $1 Million to the PAC of QAnon Promoter Who Allegedly Photographed Sex in GOP Office
“Musk offered people money to register to vote and then subsequently got sued by the Philadelphia district attorney and warned by the Justice Department that the scheme is likely illegal. He hired an army of canvassers only to see many of them game a GOTV app to make it seem as if they had knocked on hundreds of doors, when, in fact, they may have been just sitting at Starbucks. And in late August, he made a $1 million donation to a political action committee founded by Scott Presler, a man who even the Republican National Committee has declined to employ because in 2016 he was allegedly caught having sex in an office the RNC shared with the Virginia GOP and posting photos of the encounter on Craigslist.”
-Stephanie Mencimer, Mother Jones
October 31, 2024
“But our new research (currently available in preprint form) indicates Musk may be wielding influence in other more subtle ways as well. However, the platform’s increasing opacity to researchers makes this difficult to say for certain. Shortly after Musk endorsed Trump’s presidential campaign, there was a statistically anomalous boost in engagement with his X account. Suddenly, his posts were getting much higher views, retweets and likes in comparison to other prominent political accounts on the platform. This raises suspicions as to whether Musk has tweaked the platform’s algorithm to increase the reach of his posts in advance of the US presidential election. It also demonstrates the problems with how social media platforms like X are currently regulated around the world.”
-Timothy Graham and Mark Andrejevic, The Conversation
Musk election cash giveaways can continue as judge mulls case
“Philadelphia District Attorney Lawrence Krasner sued Musk this week over the $1m (£770,000) giveaways and said Musk ‘must be stopped, immediately, before the upcoming presidential election.’ At a hearing on Thursday, Judge Angelo Foglietta said the lawsuit will be put on hold while a federal court decides whether to take up the case. If the federal court chooses not to rule on the matter, the case will go back to the state court.”
-Ana Faguy, BBC News
How Elon Musk Helped Fuel the U.K.’s Far-Right Riots
“Throughout, the main forum where right-wing pundits and influencers stoked public anger was X. But a key driver of the unrest was the platform’s owner himself, Elon Musk. He would link the riots to mass immigration, at one point posting that ‘civil war’ in the U.K. was inevitable. He trolled the newly elected British prime minister, Keir Starmer — whose Labour Party won power in July after 14 years of Conservative rule — for supposedly being biased against right-wing ‘protesters.’ After Nigel Farage, the leader of radical-right party Reform U.K. and Trump ally, posted on X that, ‘Keir Starmer poses the biggest threat to free speech we’ve seen in our history,’ Musk replied: ‘True.’ Anything Musk even slightly interacted with during the days of violence received a huge boost, due to the way he has reportedly tinkered with X’s algorithm and thanks to his 200 million followers, the largest following on X. ‘He’s the curator-in-chief — he’s the man with the Midas touch,’ says Marc Owen Jones, an expert on far-right disinformation and associate professor at Northwestern University in Qatar. ‘He boosted accounts that were contributing to the narratives of disinformation and anti-Muslim hate speech that were fueling these riots.’”
-Darren Loucaides, Rolling Stone
How Elon Musk Changed Course to Go All Out for Trump
“He’s met with fellow billionaires and businessmen to strategize on how to elect Mr. Trump, despite criticizing similar elite gatherings last year as akin to “an unelected world government.” He has poured nearly $120 million into a fierce effort to support Mr. Trump, after criticizing other social media billionaires for getting involved in elections. And his platform has suppressed news stories from outlets he sees as biased against Mr. Trump, despite his stated commitment to free speech.”
-Ryan Mac, The New York Times
Judge declines to block Elon Musk $1 million voter giveaway as billionaire seeks to move case
“A Pennsylvania state judge said on Thursday he would not immediately move forward with a lawsuit that seeks to stop Elon Musk's $1 million voter giveaway ahead of the Nov. 5 U.S. presidential election. At a hearing in Pennsylvania, Judge Angelo Foglietta said he would place the lawsuit on hold while a federal court considers whether to take up the case. Musk's bid to move the case frees him to continue the giveaway, because the matter likely won't be resolved until after Tuesday's election.”
-Jack Queen, Reuters
October 30, 2024
Workers Say They Were Tricked and Threatened as Part of Elon Musk’s Get-Out-the-Vote Effort
“In Michigan, canvassers and paid door knockers for the former president, contracted by a firm associated with America PAC, have been subjected to poor working conditions: A number of them have been driven around in the back of a seatless U-Haul van, according to video obtained by WIRED, and threatened that their lodging at a local motel wouldn’t be paid for if they didn’t meet canvassing quotas. One door knocker alleges that they didn’t even know they were signing up for anything having to do with Musk or Trump.”
-Jake Lahut, WIRED
Elon Musk’s SpaceX, Already a Leader in Satellites, Gets Into the Spy Game
“SpaceX over the last year started to move in a big way into the business of building military and spy satellites, an industry that has long been dominated by major contractors like Raytheon and Northrop Grumman as well as smaller players like York Space Systems. This shift comes as the Pentagon and U.S. spy agencies are preparing to spend billions of dollars to build a series of new constellations of low-earth-orbit satellites, much of it in response to recent moves by China to build its own space-based military systems. SpaceX is poised to capitalize on that, generating a new wave of questions inside the federal government about the company’s growing dominance as a military space contractor and Mr. Musk’s extensive business operations in China and his relations with foreign government leaders, possibly including President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia. Mr. Musk is also unpredictable in a sector in which security is often perceived to be synonymous with predictability. He chafes at many of the processes and rules of government, saying they hold back progress, and wants to make his own calls.”
-Eric Lipton, The New York Times
An Elon Musk-backed political group is posting fake Kamala Harris ads on Facebook
“A series of ads that look like they are from the Harris campaign are spreading falsehoods about her current policy positions, including that she wants to institute a mandatory gun-buyback program and give Medicare benefits and drivers’ licenses to undocumented immigrants. One of the ads asserts Harris wants to ban fracking. None of this is true.”
-Bobby Allyn, NPR
Elon Musk Wants You to Think This Election Is Being Stolen
“Only Musk can know what he thought he was buying two years ago, though it seems clear the purchase was ideological in nature. In any case, the true value of X—the specific, chaotic return on his investment—has become readily apparent in these teeth-gnashing final days leading up to November 5.”
-Charlie Warzel, The Atlantic
Elon Musk’s fact-check system, Community Notes, is failing on X
“Musk has touted the crowdsourcing program, called Community Notes, as ‘the best source of truth on the internet.’ But the majority of accurate fact checks proposed by users on political posts are never shown to the public, according to research from the nonprofit Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) and a separate data analysis by The Washington Post — suggesting that the feature is failing to provide a meaningful check on misinformation.”
-Will Oremus, Trisha Thadani, and Jeremy B. Merrill, The Washington Post
October 29, 2024
On Elon Musk’s X, Republican tweets go viral as Democrats disappear
“Politicians on both sides of the aisle have struggled to win the attention they once enjoyed on the platform formerly known as Twitter, according to The Post’s review of months of data for the 100 top-tweeting congressional accounts, including senators, representatives and committees, equal parts Democrat and Republican. But some of their tweets are still going mega-viral — virtually all of them from Republicans, the analysis shows. The Republicans have also seen huge spikes in follower counts over the Democrats, and their tweets have collectively received billions more views.”
-Drew Harwell and Jeremy B. Merrill, The Washington Post
Elon Musk Bought a Texas Compound for His 11 Kids and Their Mothers
“On a quiet, leafy street of multimillion-dollar properties, one stands out: a 14,400-square-foot mansion that looks like a villa plucked from the hills of Tuscany and transplanted to Austin, Texas. This is where Elon Musk, 53, the world’s richest man and perhaps the most important campaign backer of former President Donald J. Trump, has been trying to establish the cornerstone of an unusual family compound, according to four people familiar with his plans.”
-Kirsten Grind, Ryan Mac and Sheera Frenkel, The New York Times
X Algorithm Feeds Users Political Content—Whether They Want It or Not
“New X users with interests in topics such as crafts, sports and cooking are being blanketed with political content and fed a steady diet of posts that lean toward Donald Trump and that sow doubt about the integrity of the Nov. 5 election, a Wall Street Journal analysis found.”
-Jack Gillum, Alexa Corse, and Adrienne Tong, The Wall Street Journal
October 28, 2024
Musk Repeatedly Raises the Idea That Harris, or He, Could Be Assassinated
“In speeches to pro-Trump voters across Pennsylvania, Elon Musk has repeated a line he uses about the assassination of Vice President Kamala Harris — saying it would be pointless because she is a ‘puppet’ of unnamed Washington power brokers.”
-David A. Farenhold, The New York Times
What Elon Musk's conversations with Putin could mean for the U.S. government
“Elon Musk's alleged conversations with Russian President Vladimir Putin have raised national security questions highlighting the U.S. government's reliance on SpaceX, the tech billionaire's astronautics company. Why it matters: The situation puts the government in the difficult position of choosing to continue its relationship with Musk despite the liability he could pose, or sever ties and lose access to services it relies on.”
-Ivana Saric, Axios
Why Does Elon Musk Still Have a Security Clearance?
“Which brings me to Elon Musk, who runs SpaceX, America’s private space contractor and an organization presumably full of people with clearances. (I emailed SpaceX to ask how many of its workers have clearances. I have not gotten an answer.) Trump is surrounded by people who shouldn’t be given a clearance to open a checking account, much less set foot in a highly classified environment. But Musk has held a clearance for years, despite ringing the insider-threat bells louder than a percussion maestro hammering a giant glockenspiel.”
-Tom Nichols, The Atlantic
Elon Musk’s America PAC uses crude, sexist attack against Harris in new ad
“The reference to vulgar language to describe Harris mirrors crude language about women, people’s genitalia and political opponents often used by Donald Trump, who recently spent a portion of a campaign rally talking about golfer Arnold Palmer’s genitals.Musk endorsed Trump this summer and has campaigned for him in Pennsylvania. America PAC has been a primary vehicle for the Tesla founder to funnel financial support to the former president’s reelection bid.”
-Brittany Gibson, Politico
October 27, 2024
Elon Musk says the real threat to democracy is the people who accuse Trump of endangering it
“Tech mogul Elon Musk, speaking at a town hall Saturday night in Pennsylvania to support Republican Donald Trump, played down the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol and exhorted supporters to cast votes early in the presidential swing state while describing mail ballots as a “recipe for fraud.”... Musk, whom Trump has vowed to give a role in his administration if he wins next month, spent nearly two hours taking questions from town hall participants. While most were laudatory and covered a variety of topics, one was particularly pointed: A man wanted to know what Musk would say to concerns from voters that Trump’s election could lead to democracy backsliding in the U.S. considering his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection.
While calling it a fair question, Musk also said that the Jan. 6 attack by Trump’s supporters has been called “some sort of violent insurrection, which is simply not the case” — a response that drew applause from the crowd. More than 100 law enforcement personnel were injured in the attack, some beaten with their own weapons, when a mob of Trump supporters who believed his lies that the 2020 election was stolen from him stormed the Capitol to stop the certification of votes.”
-Mark Scolforo, The Associated Press
Elon Musk hopes Trump victory will help his $44bn Twitter bet pay off
“With a $270bn fortune, Musk can sustain X financially, but [Nic Newman, a senior research associate at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism] says that he will weigh the cost of the deal against the publicity for his political views, his even higher public profile since the takeover and whether his personal and financial support for Donald Trump pays off at the US presidential election next month. ‘Whether all that was worth $44bn remains an open question and may partly depend on whether a grateful Trump is re-elected,’ adds Newman.”
-Dan Milmo, The Guardian
October 26, 2024
Elon Musk, enemy of ‘open borders,’ launched his career working illegally
“Musk in recent months has amplified the Republican presidential candidate’s claims that “open borders” and undocumented immigrants are destroying America, broadcasting those views to more than 200 million followers on the site formerly known as Twitter, which Musk bought in 2022 and later renamed X. What Musk has not publicly disclosed is that he did not have the legal right to work while building the company that became Zip2, which sold for about $300 million in 1999. It was Musk’s steppingstone to Tesla and the other ventures that have made him the world’s wealthiest person — and arguably America’s most successful immigrant.”
-Maria Sacchetti, Faiz Siddiqui and Nick Miroff, The Washington Post
Musk’s X to undershoot revenue goals from political advertising
"Elon Musk’s X is on track to fall well short of its goal of bringing in $100mn in revenue from political advertising in 2024, raising just $15mn in the year to date, largely from an increasing reliance on Republicans and the Trump campaign. Last year, X chief executive Linda Yaccarino told industry figures she was aiming to make $100mn annually in political ad revenues in an election year, according to several people familiar with the projections. The company is trying to offset revenue losses caused by big brands pulling spending from the platform. However, data from X’s political ads transparency library analyzed by the Financial Times show that the company has brought in less than a fifth of its target as of October 23, with under two weeks to go until the November 5 vote."
-Hannah Murphy and Peter Andringa, The Financial Times
Musk gives at least $132 million to elect Trump, GOP allies
“Elon Musk gave another $56 million to elect Donald Trump and other Republicans in the final weeks of the 2024 election, bringing to at least $132 million the amount spent by the world’s richest person to elevate his allies to the White House and Congress, federal filings show. The donations — revealed in disclosures with the Federal Election Commission Thursday — show that the Tesla Inc. and SpaceX chief executive officer has poured money into the Washington trifecta: funding Trump’s White House bid, along with supporting House and Senate Republicans. Musk, who had only given modest political donations until the 2024 election cycle, funneled $43.6 million in the first half of October into America PAC, the group he founded, bringing his total for the year to $118.6 million. He also spent millions more spreading money around the political system which helps him build a network of allies.”
-Bill Allison and Bloomberg, Fortune
October 25, 2024
Elon Musk's Secret Conversations With Vladimir Putin, a WSJ Investigation
“Knowledge of Musk’s Kremlin contacts appears to be a closely held secret in government. Several White House officials said they weren’t aware of them. The topic is highly sensitive, given Musk’s increasing involvement in the Trump campaign and the approaching U.S. presidential election, less than two weeks away. Musk didn’t respond to requests for comment. The billionaire has called criticism from some quarters that he has become an apologist for Putin “absurd” and has said his companies ‘have done more to undermine Russia than anything.’”
-Thomas Grove, Warren P. Strobel, Aruna Viswanatha, Gordon Lubold and Sam Schechner, The Wall Street Journal
Musk's election falsehoods travel hundreds of times further on X than fact-checks from officials
"As Elon Musk continues to aggressively share conspiracy theories and misinformation about elections on X, election officials are fighting back. But even as they are speaking out to try to counteract Musk, the owner of X since 2022, they’re being drowned out on a platform that seemingly favors falsities. Corrections to Musk’s lies from election officials like Michigan County Clerk Barb Bynum, who regularly uses her 25,000-follower account to share accurate information about how elections work, have oftentimes received far less engagement on the platform."
-Kevin Collier, NBC News
Elon Musk's grip on tech and politics is getting stronger
“Musk has regularly been using the influence he wields through his companies to weigh in on political debates in countries around the world, from Brazil to Germany. The 53-year-old's intervention in politics, unprecedented in its openness and visibility, highlights how a few private tech companies and their executives hold increasingly unchecked power over decisions traditionally reserved for governments, digital rights experts warn. ‘The kinds of technologies Musk operates are highly critical, and the companies he owns are incredibly influential and positioned at key junctures in terms of access to information and geopolitics,’ said Marietje Schaake, a fellow at Stanford University's Cyber Policy Center and author of The Tech Coup: How to Save Democracy from Silicon Valley.”
-Janosch Delcker, DeutscheWelle
Elon Musk might be hurting Donald Trump more than helping: YF survey
"Yahoo Finance surveyed more than 4,000 of our regular users and found that Musk’s involvement with Trump’s campaign could have the opposite of the intended effect. We asked respondents if Musk’s newfound alliance with Trump would make people more or less likely to vote for the former president. Among all respondents, 25% said it would make them more likely to vote for Trump, while 28% said it would make them less likely. That’s a net loss for Trump of 3 percentage points. Forty-six percent said it wouldn’t affect their voting choice either way. Among people saying they remain undecided, 21% said Musk’s involvement would make them more likely to vote for Trump, while 28% said less likely. That’s a 7-point deficit among the types of voters likely to make the difference in a race that’s so tight analysts consider it a coin toss."
-Rick Newman, Yahoo! Finance
October 24, 2024
Elon Musk Is Now X’s Biggest Promoter of Anti-Immigrant Conspiracies
“Immigration and voter fraud has become, by far, the entrepreneur’s favorite and most popular policy topic online, according to a large-scale Bloomberg analysis of his posts on X, the social network he owns, where he has more than 200 million followers. In 2024, Musk’s frequent posts on immigration — including claims about the crimes attributed to migrants, the pace of their entry into the US, and the false assertion that Democrats are using them to cast votes — have received more reposts than any other policy issue he writes about.”
-Davey Alba, Julia Love, Jeff Kao and Leonardo Nicoletti, Bloomberg
Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite business is set to boom if Trump wins
“Elon Musk’s fast-growing satellite business Starlink could be poised to gain billions of dollars more in federal contracts and subsidies under a Donald Trump presidency, industry experts say, in a reflection of the world’s richest individual’s deepening financial stake in Washington politics.”
-Eva Dou, The Washington Post
October 23, 2024
Justice Department has a warning for Elon Musk over voter sweepstakes
“A political action committee running Elon Musk’s controversial sweepstakes offering million-dollar prizes to registered voters in swing states has received a warning from the Justice Department that the unusual incentive may violate federal law, a person familiar with the message said. The head of DOJ’s Election Crimes Branch, Robert Heberle, sent a letter Monday to an attorney for America PAC cautioning that the giveaway could violate a federal law against paying anyone to vote or register to vote, said the person, who was granted anonymity to discuss a letter that has not been publicly released.”
-Josh Gerstein, Politico
A Philly Republican election official called out Elon Musk for ballot-harvesting disinformation on X
"A Republican elections official in Philadelphia called out Elon Musk on Wednesday for spreading “disinformation” by retweeting a false claim that a Center City social services organization was involved in widespread ballot harvesting."
-William Bender, The Philadelphia Inquirer
October 22, 2024
Pressure is mounting on prosecutors to review Musk’s $1M swing-state petition giveaway
“Pressure is mounting on state and federal prosecutors to investigate tech billionaire Elon Musk’s $1 million lottery-style giveaway to registered voters in seven battleground states. A Justice Department spokesperson said Tuesday that it had received a letter from 11 former government officials including several Republican ex-prosecutors urging the department to investigate whether Musk’s daily prizes violate a federal law prohibiting paying people to register to vote.”
-By David Ingram, Ken Dilanian, Michael Kosnar, Fallon Gallagher and Lora Kolodny, CNBC
Michigan secretary of state calls Elon Musk’s voting claim ‘dangerous disinformation’
"Michigan’s top elections official defended the state’s elections after repeated attacks on X from Elon Musk, who spread false claims about inactive voters. Jocelyn Benson, the Democratic secretary of state in Michigan, corrected Musk multiple times in recent days and called his comments on voter list maintenance ‘dangerous disinformation.’ Musk first reposted a video about inactive voters who remain on Michigan’s rolls, saying: ‘Michigan has more registered voters than eligible citizens!?’ Musk has a penchant for sharing false, misleading or incomplete information about elections and voting processes."
-Rachel Leingang, The Guardian
Elon Musk's $1 million election giveaway tests limits of election law
“Adav Noti of the nonpartisan Campaign Legal Center agreed, saying it is illegal to give out money on the condition that people are registered to vote. Weiner of the Brennan Center said the promotion is legally “fishy” but falls into a gray area. The question boils down to whether signing the petition is merely a pretext for getting people to register to vote, he said. But Smith of Capital University said Musk has other plausible reasons for wanting people to sign the petition, including gathering names of likely voters who support his causes.”
-Jack Queens, Reuters
October 21, 2024
Elon Musk's PAC Is Buying Ads for Donald Trump on Elon Musk's X
“The Elon Musk–backed America PAC has spent thousands of dollars advertising on the Elon Musk–owned social media platform X to support former president Donald Trump’s campaign. According to X’s political ad disclosure data, between July 8 and October 1 the America PAC ran 59 ads, costing more than $166,000 and yielding, per X’s metrics, 32,058,424 impressions. All of the ads targeted swing states: Georgia, Nevada, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Arizona, and Wisconsin.”
-Vittoria Elliott, WIRED
CNN reporter goes to Musk town hall. Here's what he saw
“CNN’s Donie O’Sullivan meets Elon Musk superfans in Pennsylvania as the billionaire campaigns there for former President Donald Trump.”
-Donie O’Sullivan, CNN
Elon Musk’s daily $1 million giveaway to registered voters could be illegal, experts say
“In an interview Sunday on NBC’s ‘Meet the Press,’ Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro said Musk’s giveaway was “deeply concerning” and is ‘something that law enforcement could take a look at.’ Shapiro, a Democrat, was previously the state attorney general. In response to Shapiro’s comments, Musk posted on X that it was ‘concerning that he would say such a thing.’ Federal law makes it a crime for anyone who ‘pays or offers to pay or accepts payment either for registration to vote or for voting.’ It’s punishable by up to five years in prison. After legal outcry over the weekend, Musk’s group tweaked some of their language around the sweepstakes. ‘When you start limiting prizes or giveaways to only registered voters or only people who have voted, that’s where bribery concerns arise,’ said Derek Muller, an election law expert who teaches at Notre Dame Law School. ‘By limiting a giveaway only to registered voters, it looks like you’re giving cash for voter registration.’”
-Marshall Cohen, CNN
Mark Cuban says ‘It’s the Harris campaign vs. Elon,’ not Trump
"Vice President Kamala Harris is campaigning for president against Elon Musk at least as much as she is against former President Donald Trump, Mark Cuban said Monday, as he advocated for the Democratic nominee as the pro-business choice. 'It’s the Harris campaign versus Elon, not even versus Trump,' the billionaire investor and former 'Shark Tank' host said on CNBC’s 'Squawk Box.'"
-Kevin Breuninger, CNBC
Elon Musk Donates Legal Maximum to Trump Campaign
“Elon Musk may have started a super PAC and poured over $75 million into supporting former President Donald J. Trump, but for months he wouldn’t do something far cheaper and less glamorous: donate the legal maximum to Mr. Trump’s campaign. Mr. Musk had flummoxed some Trump fund-raising officials by declining to give a ‘super max’ check to Mr. Trump’s campaign, according to a person briefed on the conversations. As recently as earlier this month, Trump officials believed he was unwilling to do so, the person said. But on Monday evening Mr. Trump’s campaign texted supporters, mostly in all caps, aiming to leverage a change in Mr. Musk’s stance: ‘Elon Musk has big news. He will match every dollar this message raises.’”
-Theodore Schleifer, The New York Times
October 20, 2024
Elon Musk offers $1 million a day to entice swing state voters to sign petition
"Elon Musk said Saturday that he would randomly award $1 million a day to registered voters who sign a petition for his pro-Trump political action committee in an effort to get his fans in swing states to the polls. Speaking at an America PAC event in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Musk said, ‘I have a surprise for you,' adding that the prize money is available “every day from now until the election.’”
-Lora Kolodny, CNBC
US Agencies Fund, and Fight With, Elon Musk. A Trump Presidency Could Give Him Power Over Them.
“Through a review of court filings, regulatory dockets and government contracting data, The New York Times has compiled an accounting of Mr. Musk’s multipronged business arrangements with the federal government, as well as the violations, fines, consent decrees and other inquiries federal agencies have ordered against his companies. Together, they show a deep web of relationships: Instead of entering this new role as a neutral observer, Mr. Musk would be passing judgment on his own customers and regulators. Already, Mr. Musk has discussed how he would use the new position to help his own companies.”
-Eric Lipton, David A. Fahrenthold, Aaron Krolik and Kirsten Grind, The New York Times
Elon Musk has a warning about California
“Elon Musk’s relationship with California has always been complicated — but Musk’s MAGAfication has made it downright rancorous…. But along the way, even as Musk forged relationships with Democratic politicians like Gov. Gavin Newsom, he began to turn on the state that helped make him. California officials have begun to turn on him, too. Members of the state’s coastal protection agency cited his support for former President Donald Trump and his “spewing and tweeting political falsehoods” last week before rejecting a Defense Department proposal to increase SpaceX launches."
-Jeremy White, Politico
October 19, 2024
Elon Musk holds Dauphin County town hall, talks free speech and investing in Pa.
“[Musk] also announced a petition that he was encouraging individuals to sign, supporting the first and second amendment. Musk then revealed that up until the election, every day a random signee will receive $1 million. One of the first winners of the $1 million was right in Swatara, an attendee named John Dreher.”
-Sarah Burns, CBS21
“Though maybe some of the other things Musk was doing were of murky legality, this one is clearly illegal. See 52 U.S.C. 10307(c): ‘Whoever knowingly or willfully gives false information as to his name, address or period of residence in the voting district for the purpose of establishing his eligibility to register or vote, or conspires with another individual for the purpose of encouraging his false registration to vote or illegal voting, or pays or offers to pay or accepts payment either for registration to vote or for voting shall be fined not more than $10,000 or imprisoned not more than five years, or both…’ (Emphasis added.)”
-Rick Hasen, Election Law Blog
“In the evolving topography of Trumpland, none of his supporters or cronies will have chits to compare with Musk’s. If Trump wins, it will likely be by a narrow margin that can be attributed to turnout. Musk can tout himself as the single variable of success. It’s not hard to imagine how the mogul will exploit this alliance. Trump has already announced that he will place him in charge of a government-efficiency commission. Or, in the Trumpian vernacular, Musk will be the ‘secretary of cost-cutting.’ SpaceX is the implied template: Musk will advocate for privatizing the government, outsourcing the affairs of state to nimble entrepreneurs and adroit technologists. That means there will be even more opportunities for his companies to score gargantuan contracts. So when Trump brags that Musk will send a rocket to Mars during his administration, he’s not imagining a reprise of the Apollo program. He’s envisioning cutting SpaceX one of the largest checks that the U.S. government has ever written. He’s talking about making the richest man in the world even richer. Of course, this could be bluster. But it is entirely consistent with the rest of the right’s program for Trump’s second term, which involves dismantling the federal government—eliminating swaths of the politically neutral civil service and entire Cabinet departments and agencies. It is exactly the kind of sweeping change that suits Musk’s grandiose sense of his own place in human history.”
-Franklin Foer, The Atlantic
Exclusive: Pro-Trump group funded by Musk struggles with outreach targets
“The political action committee funded by billionaire Elon Musk to help re-elect former U.S. President Donald Trump is struggling in some swing states to meet doorknocking goals and is investigating claims that some canvassers lied about the number of voters they have contacted, according to people involved in the group's efforts. The difficulties, in pivotal battleground states including Wisconsin and Nevada, come as the group, America PAC, races to enlist voters behind the Republican candidate in the final two weeks before the Nov. 5 election. Four people involved in the group's outreach told Reuters that managers warned canvassers they are missing targets and needed to raise the number of would-be voters they contact.”
-Rachael Levy and Alexandra Ulmer, Reuters
Elon Musk’s Fake Sites and Fake Texts Impersonating the Harris Campaign
“There’s deeply cynical and then there’s things which might be illegal. In the first category we have an Elon Musk-funded PAC microtargeting Jewish and Arab communities with diametrically opposed ads about Kamala Harris’s support for Israel or Palestine. Amazingly cynical. But then you have what I’m going to describe next, which comes from another Musk-funded dark money operation. They have set up fake sites impersonating the Harris campaign using fake policy positions and then sending out text messages also impersonating the campaign which aim to drive voters to the fake site. (A lot of potential legal and regulatory questions turns on word like ‘fake’ and ‘impersonating,’ which we’ll return to in a moment.) I found out about this from this article by Anna Massoglia at OpenSecrets.”
-Josh Marshall, Talking Points Memo
October 18, 2024
“Billionaire Elon Musk has upped his financial offer for registered swing state voters to sign a conservative-leaning petition. On Thursday, Musk wrote on X that his pro-Trump super PAC would give $100 to signees and those who refer them… The program appears to avoid breaking campaign finance laws, which make it illegal to pay people to register to vote, because the payment is for signing the petition and referring registered voters to sign the petition, rather than for registration.”
-Kat Tenbarge, NBC News
The DC bureaucrat who could deliver billions to Elon Musk
“Elon Musk has forged a relationship with a Republican figure who could open up a geyser of federal cash for his Starlink satellite internet business — and it’s not the person running for president. Online and in person, the tech titan has been building a public alliance around his company’s policy goals with Brendan Carr, the senior Republican on the Federal Communications Commission — an unusual link between a regulator and his potential beneficiary that could mean a payday for the world’s richest man.”
-John Hendel, Politico
On the Campaign Trail With Elon Musk: Offering Young Men an American Dream
“They weren’t the lone fanboys eager for the chance to see Musk in person. Several guys told me that they didn’t consider themselves politically active but jumped at the chance to come to a Musk rally.”
-Tim Higgins, The Wall Street Journal
“An Elon Musk-funded group called Future Coalition PAC is targeting Muslim voters in Michigan and Jewish voters in Pennsylvania with diametrically opposed political advertisements about Kamala Harris. In areas of Michigan with relatively large Muslim populations, the Super PAC is painting Harris as a close friend of Israel and is suggesting that she is beholden to the beliefs of her Jewish husband Doug Emhoff; in parts of Pennsylvania with relatively large Jewish populations, the advertisements call Harris antisemitic and say she ‘support[s] denying Israel the weapons needed to defeat the Hamas terrorists who massacred thousands.’”
-Jason Koebler, 404Media
How Tech Billionaires Became the G.O.P.’s New Donor Class
“Now, over a dinner of shrimp and lobster tails, he put the matter in stark, existential terms: Were Biden to win in November, the Democrats would use the ongoing flood of immigrants to create a permanent majority. If they failed to get Trump into office, Musk said, this would be America’s last free election. Musk has always seen himself as the protagonist of his own science-fiction novel, on a hero’s quest to save humanity. It’s the legacy of a childhood as a geeky bookworm but also of his years in Silicon Valley during the great tech boom of the early 2000s. He and his fellow tech leaders were not just businessmen; as they saw it, they were visionary founders reinventing the world. They knew what to do and how to do it. The hundreds of billions of dollars that they accumulated along the way only confirmed the importance of their mission and validated their unique ability to carry it out. Over the course of this election cycle, a group of these men have coalesced around a new mission: putting Donald Trump back in the White House.”
-Jonathan Mahler, Ryan Mac and Theodore Schleifer, The New York Times
Elon Musk is Trump’s biggest cheerleader. How could he affect election results?
“If Trump and Musk occasionally seem like an odd pair on paper – Trump has threatened to remove an electric vehicle tax credit, while Musk is CEO of perhaps the world’s most famous EV company – one point of alignment is a vehement dislike for regulators. Musk’s longstanding battles with government offices like the Environmental Protection Agency and Federal Aviation Administration could shift in his favor under a Trump administration that is likely to drastically cut their resources and weaken their authority.”
-Nick Robins-Early and Rachel Leingang, The Guardian
Elon Musk’s riskiest bet yet: Donald Trump
“The owner of Tesla, SpaceX, xAI and X has aspirations to shape the future of humanity — a Neuralink chip in the brain, a robot in the home, a driverless car to get to work, a rocket to colonise Mars. Musk’s bet appears to be that if Trump wins, he would gain substantial influence over how the government treats his companies. As the world’s richest man, there is nothing Elon needs. He is just getting involved The gamble would pay off if SpaceX and its Starlink satellites can earn more contracts from the US national security apparatus or if Tesla could win over Republicans sceptical of electric vehicles — and perhaps limit probes by regulators into the safety of its self-driving technology. And under Trump, X would be much less likely to clash with the administration over Musk’s absolute conception of ‘free speech.’”
-Alex Rogers, Stephen Morris and Kana Inagaki, The Financial Times
October 17, 2024
Elon Musk Created A Mysterious Corporation Called ‘United States Of America Inc’
“Republican mega-donor Elon Musk has quietly incorporated two new companies that could indicate his further involvement in U.S. politics, Forbes has learned. Established earlier this month, the mysterious entities were formed in the billionaire’s home state of Texas using an address shared with his family office; they are United States of America Inc., and Group America LLC. Neither has been previously reported. There’s little to illuminate their purpose, but United States of America Inc. appears to be a holding company and identifies Musk as its sole director. It’s listed as the managing member of Group America LLC, which does not name Musk, but is linked to him through the address that’s exclusively shared by a number of his companies, including Musk Ventures and several LLCs he’s reportedly also used to conduct business. Representatives for Musk did not respond to a request for comment.”
-Sarah Emerson, Forbes
Musk pushes debunked Dominion voting conspiracy theory at first Pennsylvania appearance
“Billionaire Elon Musk promoted debunked conspiracy theories about election fraud Thursday at the first of a series of planned campaign events across Pennsylvania meant to rally support for former President Donald Trump’s campaign. At a town hall hosted at a high school outside Philadelphia, Musk referred to the false conspiracy theory that Dominion Voting Systems was part of a plot to rig U.S. elections in recent years.”
-Kat Tenbarge, Ben Goggin and Emma Barnett, NBC News
Elon Musk Is Directing All X Litigation Toward His Favorite Judge
“The Northern District of Texas, filled with GOP-appointed judges with a history of precedent-busting far-right opinions, is a magnet for rightwing litigants. Conservative groups from around the country flock to Texas courthouses to challenge Biden administration rules. Some have relocated in order to bring suits there, and brand new legal groups spring into existence there. Even before attention fell on X’s new terms, Musk had established himself as one of these forum-shoppers.”
-Pema Levy, Mother Jones
October 16, 2024
Elon Musk Might Have Broken the Law Against Bribing Voters. Whoops!
"This election we are seeing more efforts to gin up turnout through payments to voters, but most of them have stayed on the legal side of the line. A few weeks ago, Elon Musk began offering payments of $47 for the referral of swing state voters who would sign a petition supporting the First and Second Amendments. The strategy was legal because no one was being paid to turn out to vote, even though money was being introduced into the process for leads for likely Trump voters…. Musk appears to have finally crossed the line Tuesday night, when he wrote on X that: ‘Tomorrow night through Monday, I will be giving a series of talks throughout Pennsylvania. If you’d like to attend one of my talks, there’s no attendance fee. You just need to have signed our petition supporting free speech & right to bear arms & have voted in this election.’ He followed up with a post stating: ‘To clarify, you need have voted in Pennsylvania.’”
-Richard Hasen, Slate
Republicans Tell Trump That Elon Musk’s Super PAC Is Blowing It
“According to two sources familiar with the situation and another person briefed on it, these close Trump allies have told him that they are worried that America PAC, an outside group that Musk created to boost turnout for Trump, is failing in critical battleground states that are likely to be won by razor-thin margins, with only weeks left to go before Election Day. Some partly blame, including when they’ve spoken to Trump, the group’s lead strategists, who are linked to the failed 2024 primary run of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.”
-Asawin Suebsaeng, Miles Klee, Andrew Perez, Rolling Stone
Elon Musk is going to stump for Trump in Pennsylvania
"Musk won’t be giving public speeches. Instead, he said he’ll be holding a 'series of talks' in the swing state, which will be free to attend for anyone who has voted in the election and signed a petition being circulated by Musk’s America PAC. (Pennsylvania early voting began on October 15th.) Musk’s super PAC — to which he claims to have contributed $75 million —is also giving voters in swing states $47 for each registered swing state voter who signs the petition. This is somehow not illegal."
-Gaby Del Valle, The Verge
Big Money Flowed to Pro-Trump Groups in the Past Three Months
“Elon Musk, the world’s richest man and the leader of Tesla and X, has invested $75 million in the super PAC that he created earlier this year, America PAC, according to the most-anticipated filing of Tuesday’s deadline. That total was actually a bit less than some people close to the group thought he might donate; they expected Mr. Musk to clear $100 million in giving from July to September. America PAC has been one of the most ambitious efforts from a political megadonor during this election cycle. Mr. Musk and his group of allied tech billionaires have sought to effectively start a voter canvassing program outside of the Trump campaign itself. Mr. Musk intentionally did not donate any money before July 1 so it would not be reported publicly until October. His first contribution, $5 million, came on July 3. Mr. Musk, who has emerged as a close confidant of Mr. Trump, gave $15 million in July, $30 million in August, and $30 million more in September. The group listed no other donors.”
-Theodore Scheifer, The New York Times
Elon Musk gives $75M to his own America PAC in push to elect Trump
“Billionaire Elon Musk gave nearly $75 million to the political action committee he created to campaign for Donald Trump, marking his latest contribution in support of the former president in the final stretch of the campaign. America PAC has emerged as a significant player in Trump’s reelection bid, with the committee launching this spring with early support from wealthy donors, including former Tesla director Antonio Gracias, Palantir co-founder and Austin-based tech investor Joe Lonsdale, and Sequoia Capital investor Shaun Maguire.”
-Clara Ence Morse and Maegan Vazquez, The Washington Post
October 15, 2024
Elon Musk’s America PAC has an old-school strategy to elect Trump
“Determined Trump supporters like McMillan, paid about $20 to $40 an hour, are the backbone of Musk’s plan to elect Trump. America PAC reported spending $87 million on the presidential race as of Oct. 9, with 61 percent committed to field operations, according to filings from the Federal Election Commission.”
-Trisha Thadani and Elizabeth Dwoskin, The Washington Post
Elon Musk’s politics are crashing hard into his business
“A clear problem has emerged for a man who became rich, famous and increasingly powerful by retailing himself to Americans as a tribune of the human future: It’s now more difficult than ever to separate Musk the businessman from Musk the political figure.”
-Christine Mui, Politico
October 12, 2024
Twitter Banned Them. What Happened When Elon Musk Brought Them Back?
"Ms. Greene and Mr. Jones are among a large set of users who were barred from the site for spreading misinformation, inciting violence or otherwise violating its rules — and were reinstated after Elon Musk bought the platform, then known as Twitter, two years ago. Many of these people picked up where they left off, according to a New York Times analysis of 50,000 posts by more than 100 high-profile reinstated users. They include Laura Loomer, a right-wing influencer who has campaigned with Mr. Trump; Mike Lindell, the chief executive of MyPillow; and Rogan O’Handley, a right-wing political commentator. All have a broad reach — at least 100,000 followers — and were identified by researchers who study disinformation or extremism on X. Most hold right-wing or even far-right views, and are part of a broader political shift underway on X."
-Kate Conger, Tiffany Hsu, and Aaron Krolik, The New York Times
October 11, 2024
Musk's "unparalleled" efforts to put Trump back in the White House
“Musk has been speaking to Trump multiple times per week and poured funding into get out the vote operations for Trump. He may even knock on doors himself in the battleground state.”
-April Rubin, Axios
Trump campaign connected with Elon Musk’s X before it blocked links to hacked materials
“Former President Donald Trump’s campaign connected with Elon Musk’s X last month to discuss hacked Trump campaign materials circulating on the social media platform before X blocked links to the files and banned the independent journalist who published the materials, a person familiar with the matter told CNN.”
-Liam Reilly, CNN
October 8, 2024
Brazil lifts ban on Musk's X after it pays $5m fine
“Brazil's Supreme Court has said it is lifting a ban on the social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter. In his decision, Justice Alexandre de Moraes said that he authorized the 'immediate return' of X's activities in the country after it paid hefty fines and blocked accounts accused of spreading misinformation. According to a statement, the site has paid fines totalling 28 million reais ($5.1m; £3.8m) and agreed to appoint a local representative, as required by Brazilian law. Moraes had blocked access to the platform, owned by Elon Musk, after it had refused to ban several profiles deemed by the government to be spreading misinformation about the 2022 Brazilian Presidential election.”
-Ben Derico and Ione Wells, BBC
Elon Musk steps into Texas legislative races with $1 million donation to business group
“Elon Musk gave $1 million last month to a powerful tort reform group that is one of the main political forces backing Republicans in battleground legislative races this fall, marking the tech mogul’s deepest foray yet into Texas politics. Musk, the billionaire chief executive of SpaceX and Tesla, has emerged recently as a key player in national politics, launching a PAC to support Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and leveraging his social media site, X, to elevate the former president. But Musk’s seven-figure donation to Texans for Lawsuit Reform — one of Texas’ most influential business groups and a central figure in the state’s internecine GOP power struggle — is the first major sign that he is willing to throw his weight around in state politics.”
-Jasper Scherer, The Texas Tribune
Elon Musk bankrolls outgunned House GOP campaigns
“Elon Musk's super PAC is providing Republicans a critical funding backstop in key House districts, pouring millions of dollars into helping GOP candidates in races across the country. Why it matters: It's a boon to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), whose primary super PAC is being heavily outspent by its Democratic counterpart in key districts.”
-Andrew Solender, Axios
Elon Musk says it would be ‘pointless’ to try to assassinate Kamala Harris
“Elon Musk, who owns the social media platform X and is a high-profile backer of former president Donald Trump, said in an interview that it would be “pointless” to try to assassinate Vice President Kamala Harris — once again publicly airing questions about why no one has tried to kill her or President Joe Biden during a stretch in which Trump has faced two apparent attempts on his life.”
-Patrick Svitek, The Washington Post
Elon Musk is piling onto all the hurricane disinformation, hampering relief efforts
“Elon Musk is using his social media network to spread election conspiracy theories about U.S. disasters — just as online falsehoods are complicating the federal response to Hurricanes Helene and Milton. Musk has helped spread accusations that the Federal Emergency Management Agency ‘actively blocked’ donations to victims of Helene and is ‘seizing goods … and locking them away to state they are their own’ — allegations that FEMA officials call false and which run afoul of state and local Republican leaders’ praise for the assistance from Washington.”
-Adam Aton, Scott Waldman, Politico
Elon Musk called Gov. Josh Shapiro during the Steelers game to talk about investing in Pennsylvania
“Musk told Shapiro he wants to invest in Pennsylvania, specifically the Pittsburgh area, two of the sources said. He was in the early stages of the idea but expressed interest in expanding his factories to the region. Politically, Musk and Shapiro are unlikely allies. Musk has become one of Trump’s most prominent, and deep-pocketed, supporters. His super PAC, America PAC, is handling much of the get-out-the-vote operation backing Trump, and Musk himself is set to campaign more in the critical state of Pennsylvania in the final weeks of the election.”
-Dasha Burns, NBC News
House investigates why the feds didn't give Musk's company more money
“Republicans in Congress are already hard at work doing billionaire Elon Musk’s bidding, in just about the most literal way possible. On Monday, Republicans on the House Oversight Committee announced an investigation into the Federal Communications Commission’s 2022 decision not to award a nearly $900 million bid for Musk’s Starlink to provide broadband internet to rural areas.The move comes after Musk, a staunch Trump supporter, used his social media platform X to claim that the government’s decision not to grant Starlink the bid was ‘illegal’ and cost lives in North Carolina. In another tweet, he promoted false claims — later amplified by Donald Trump — that the government was preventing Starlink servers from being delivered to victims of Hurricane Helene.”
-Ja’han Jones, NBC News
Elon Musk reposts false Virginia voter fraud tweet
“Elon Musk unearthed a nearly year-old tweet sharing false information about Henrico's 2020 voter turnout this weekend, leading the county to correct him on his own platform on Monday..: The repost on Sunday night is among the latest in a slew of posts from Musk about unsubstantiated election fraud claims.”
-Sabrina Moreno, Axios
Return of X: the market pressures that made Musk accept Moraes' decisions
“After confirming the intention to comply with the decisions, experts pointed out that X's change of position was probably more a response to pressure from investors, shareholders and advertisers associated with Musk's companies than a political concession. ‘The decision seems much more economic to me than a political concession,’ said Roberto Kanter, a professor at FGV (Fundação Getulio Vargas) and an expert in entrepreneurship. The economist identified a ‘corporate arrogance’ that may have led the platform to overvalue its position in Brazil when, in reality, Musk's companies had a lot to lose in the local market.”
-Julia Braun, BBC Brasil
October 7, 2024
Supreme Court boots Elon Musk’s fight with Jack Smith over Trump’s Twitter records
“The Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear an appeal from Elon Musk’s X Corp. claiming special counsel Jack Smith violated the First Amendment when he obtained a search warrant for former President Donald Trump’s messages on Twitter and then barred the company from disclosing it.The court acted without comment and there were no noted dissents.”
-John Fritze, CNN
Democrats dominate spending on political ads – except on Elon Musk’s X
“Democrats are massively outspending Republicans on internet campaign ads but one social network is a notable exception: X, owned by Elon Musk, who has increasingly used the platform to elevate his chosen candidate, former president Donald Trump. Accounts backing Republican candidates spent three times as much on political ads on X than those backing Democrats from March 6 to Oct. 1 — $3 million to $1 million — according to an analysis of company data by AdImpact and The Washington Post.”
-Trisha Thadani and Adriana Navarro, The Washington Post
Musk the surrogate: The tech titan will hit the campaign trail for Trump
“Tech billionaire Elon Musk will ramp up his personal efforts to elect Donald Trump in the remaining weeks of the election — including making visits to Pennsylvania to campaign for the former president.Musk intends to appear in the swing state in the four weeks leading up to Nov. 5, according to a person who has spoken with his team and was granted anonymity to speak freely because they weren’t authorized to do so. He is expected to make the stops with the backing of America PAC, a pro-Trump super PAC he formed. He may make other appearances in the state independent of his super PAC — as he did on Sunday evening, when he showed up to the Pittsburgh Steelers game wearing a MAGA hat and was greeted by Steelers owner Art Rooney II, among others.”
-Alex Isenstadt, Politico
October 6, 2024
Elon Musk Leaps to Trump’s Side in Rally Appearance
Elon Musk, the billionaire head of Tesla and SpaceX, strode onto the stage to cheers at Donald J. Trump’s rally on Saturday night, lifted his arms above his head and jumped into the air — twice — exposing his navel as his shirt rode up. Wearing an ‘Occupy Mars’ shirt underneath a sport coat, he nodded to his black “Make America Great Again” baseball cap. ‘As you can see, I’m not just MAGA, I’m dark MAGA,’ he said. Mr. Musk publicly endorsed Mr. Trump in the minutes after a gunman tried to kill the former president on July 13 in Butler, Pa., in a post on X, the social media platform he owns. So when Mr. Trump returned Saturday to hold a rally at the same venue where he was attacked, he brought Mr. Musk along. In addition to bouncing up and down onstage, he urged the crowd to ‘Fight! Fight! Fight!’ — an echo of the words Mr. Trump had uttered after the attack.”
-Ryan Mac, The New York Times
October 5, 2024
Trump holds Pennsylvania rally at same venue of first assassination attempt, joined by Musk, Vance
Midway through Trump’s speech, Elon Musk came up on stage to laud the former president.’The true test of someone’s character is how they behave under fire,’ Musk said, sporting a black MAGA baseball cap, black blazer and ‘Occupy Mars’ t-shirt. ‘As you can see, I’m not just MAGA, I’m Dark MAGA,’ the tech billionaire said. ‘This is no ordinary election,” he continued. ‘President Trump must win to preserve the Constitution. He must win to preserve democracy in America.’ Trump is charged with crimes related to his alleged effort to overturn his loss to President Joe Biden in the 2020 election.
-Lora Kolodny, CNBC
October 4, 2024
Buttigieg claps back at Elon Musk for false claims about Helene federal response
"Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg spoke directly to Elon Musk Friday on the billionaire’s X platform, part of an effort to counter false conspiracies about federal disaster aid for victims of Hurricane Helene that Musk spread on X, where his follower count stands over 200 million."
-Lora Kolodny, CNBC
Exclusive: Conservative think tank targeting NASA employees' communications about Musk, Trump
"An influential conservative think tank has asked the National Aeronautics and Space Administration to disclose what employees are discussing internally about billionaire Elon Musk and former President Donald Trump, according to federal records reviewed by Reuters. The effort, involving scores of Freedom of Information requests filed by the Heritage Foundation, is part of that organization's ongoing push to help Trump weed out uncooperative civil servants if he is reelected to the White House in November, one of its executives told Reuters."
-Marisa Taylor, Reuters
Elon Musk says he will attend Trump rally at Pennsylvania shooting site
"Elon Musk plans to attend Donald Trump’s rally on Saturday at the site in Butler, Pennsylvania, where the former president narrowly avoided assassination in July. ‘I will be there to support!” the tech billionaire replied to a post by Trump on Musk’s social media platform, X, saying he was returning to the Butler Farm show grounds.”
-Edward Helmore, The Guardian
Brazil's top court says X paid pending fines to wrong bank
"Brazil's Supreme Court said on Friday that lawyers representing social media platform X did not pay pending fines to the proper bank, postponing its decision on whether to allow the tech firm to resume services in Brazil. The payment of the fines, which X lawyers argued that the company had paid correctly, is the only outstanding measure demanded by the court in order to authorize X to operate again in Brazil."
-Luciana Novaes Magalhaes, Reuters
October 3, 2024
Elon Musk-backed PAC, Turning Point combine operations for Trump in Wisconsin
“Turning Point Action and America PAC, the pro-Donald Trump group largely funded by billionaire Elon Musk, are joining forces in Wisconsin — with Musk’s group now taking the lead there in the final stretch ahead of the election. Hundreds of ‘ballot chasers’ that had been hired by Turning Point this week are combining with America PAC’s operation in Wisconsin, according to four people with knowledge of the arrangement, granted anonymity to speak freely.”
-Natalie Allison, Politico
Musk faces regulators' questions over X takeover - but will he show up?
Elon Musk has been ordered by a federal court to answer further questions from lawyers about his takeover of Twitter - now called X - on Thursday. And the financial world has one question: Will he be there? Last month, he was a no-show for a court ordered appearance at the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) office in Los Angeles. Thursday's planned interview is part of a high-level investigation into whether Mr Musk waited too long to disclose he was building up a stake in Twitter before acquiring the social media platform in 2022.
-Lily Jamali, BBC
October 2, 2024
Elon Musk Gave Tens of Millions to Republican Causes Far Earlier Than Previously Known
“Elon Musk’s financial support for Republican causes has been much more extensive and started earlier than previously known. The Tesla CEO quietly gave tens of millions of dollars to groups with ties to Trump aide Stephen Miller and supporters of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’s presidential bid, according to people familiar with the matter. The financial contributions, which haven’t previously been reported, show how Musk, who seemed to undergo a rapid political transformation this year, was a major force in funding Republican initiatives and candidates well before starting a super political-action committee in support of former President Donald Trump. They also make him one of the biggest donors to conservative causes, which in combination with his large social-media following makes him one of the most influential figures in U.S. politics. His track record thus far in backing winners, however, is mixed at best.”
-Dana Mattioli, Joe Palazzolo, and Khadeeja Safdar, The Wall Street Journal
Exclusive: Musk funded right-wing political non-profit years before he endorsed Trump, sources say
“Elon Musk secretly funded a conservative political group in recent years, according to four people familiar with his donations, illustrating quiet financial support for right-wing causes even before the billionaire entrepreneur in July endorsed former President Donald Trump's bid for re-election. Two of the people familiar with the donations told Reuters that Musk's contributions to the organization, Building America's Future, had started by 2022. One of those people and a third source said the donations amounted to millions of dollars, significantly boosting a group whose advertisements and social media campaigns have criticized the Biden administration and progressive political platforms of the sort that Musk himself has increasingly denounced.”
-Alexandra Ulmer and Rachael Levy, Reuters
Elon Musk’s nonsensical lies about immigrant voting, briefly explained
This past weekend, X owner Elon Musk elevated a false right-wing talking point about immigration, claiming Democrats were fast-tracking citizenship applications to rig elections in the party’s favor. ‘If even 1 in 20 illegals become citizens per year, something that the Democrats are expediting as fast as humanly possible, that would be about 2 million new legal voters in 4 years,’ Musk claimed. ‘The voting margin in the swing states is often less than 20 thousand votes. That means if the ‘Democratic’ Party succeeds, there will be no more swing states!!’ It’s a baseless allegation, and one that advances the far-right’s racist ‘Great Replacement Theory, which suggests that Democrats are utilizing immigration policies to replace white Americans — in this case, white voters — with minorities.”
-Li Zhou, Vox
September 30, 204
Elon Musk: Voting for Trump ‘only way’ to ‘save’ democracy
Tech billionaire Elon Musk said Sunday that former President Trump must win the election in November if America wants to preserve its democracy. ‘Very few Americans realize that, if Trump is NOT elected, this will be the last election,’ Musk posted on the social platform X.
‘Far from being a threat to democracy, he is the only way to save it!’ he continued. Musk outlined a theory whereby Democrats, he said, are expediting the process for residents who immigrated illegally to the U.S. to become citizens and gain legal voter status. Musk suggested those new voters would support Democrats in elections, and, according to him, Democrats would eventually dominate American politics.
-Sarah Fortinsky
Elon Musk’s X Is Now Worth Around A Fifth Of The $44 Billion He Paid For It, Fidelity Says
Elon Musk’s X is worth a little more than one-fifth of the $44 billion he paid to acquire the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, according to Fidelity, the latest in a series of valuation cuts by Fidelity since Musk’s takeover in 2022.
-Ty Roush
Elon Musk calls Sen. Wiener ‘utter scumbag’
“California Sen. Scott Wiener traded jabs with Elon Musk on Monday after the X CEO called him an ‘utter scumbag.’ Musk made the comment on X in response to a tweet from an account called ‘End Wokeness’ that highlighted several bills Wiener has supported, many of which are related to transgender laws. Wiener responded to Musk calling him a scumbag with a gif that reads, ‘I think that’s called projection, dude.’”
Phil Mayer, KRON
September 27, 2024
5 Days With Elon Musk on X: Deepfakes, Falsehoods and Lots of Memes
“Since he bought the platform known as Twitter in 2022, he has shown a willingness to elevate unfounded claims as he has embraced a more conservative political posture, including by endorsing Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign in July. Nearly a third of his posts last week were false, misleading or missing vital context. They included misleading posts claiming Democrats were making memes “illegal” and falsehoods that they want to “open the border” to gain votes from illegal immigrants. His misleading posts were seen more than 800 million times on X, underscoring Mr. Musk’s unique role as the platform’s most-followed account and a significant source of its misleading content.”
-Stuart A. Thompson, The New York Times
"Misinformation superspreaders": Elon Musk is personally boosting conspiracy theorists on X
“An analysis from NewsGuard shows that Musk has advanced at least 17 false narratives from the group’s misinformation database, from sharing a video promoting the narrative that Haitians eat pets to accusing Democrats of "importing voters." The billionaire also frequently amplifies some of the platform’s worst offenders in terms of spreading false claims: of the five accounts he interacts with most frequently, four are "misinformation superspreaders" who have grown their followings as a result. One account, @EndWokeness, which spread racist lies about Haitian immigrants, experienced a 30% follower count bump in the six months in which Musk repeatedly boosted it. Another, @libsoftiktok, whose anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric inspired bomb threats at a children's hospital and who falsely claimed that schools had provided litter boxes to children who identify as cats, saw a 14.8% growth in their following. On Tuesday, Musk engaged with a report from @EndWokeness criticizing George Soros’ company's acquisition of a radio station group, writing “Crazy” in a quote-tweet that’s been viewed 29 million times. Two other accounts that experienced massive boosts from Musk either amplified or outright invented conspiracy theories suggesting that Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign adopted a Nazi slogan; that Ukraine sold weapons to Hamas; and that Venezuelan immigrants had overtaken an apartment complex.”
-Griffin Eckstein, Salon
Trump ground game operation now largely run by Elon Musk-backed group
“Donald Trump’s wider ground game operation in crucial battleground states is now largely outsourced to America Pac, the political action committee backed by the billionaire Elon Musk, according to multiple people familiar with the situation. The Trump campaign gambled with its voter turnout efforts for the 2024 cycle and outsourced it to Super Pacs, while it targeted its focus on turning out Trump supporters in rural areas who typically do not vote. But while the Trump campaign once predicted having multiple Pacs doing get-out-the-vote work, with six weeks until the election, only America Pac has a material presence of 300 to 400 paid and part-time people knocking on doors in each of the seven battleground states, the people said.”
-Hugo Lowell, The Guardian
September 26, 2024
Musk hits back after being shunned from UK summit
“The world's richest person, Elon Musk, has hit back after not being invited to the UK government's International Investment Summit. He was not invited due to his social media posts during last month’s riots, the BBC understands.”
-Faisal Islam, BBC
September 25, 2024
Musk decries government ‘censorship.’ His X has been more compliant.
“X owner Elon Musk is the world’s wealthiest flag-bearer for free speech, but under his leadership the social media platform is acceding to government requests to take down or withhold user content at a significantly higher rate than it did in the years leading up to his 2022 purchase. The site acted on 71 percent of the legal requests it received to remove content in the first half of this year, up 20 percent from the last time it reported the figure in 2021 and more than double the rate in preceding years, according to a new transparency report X published Wednesday and a Washington Post review of past disclosure data.”
-Cristiano Lima, The Washington Post
September 24, 2024
‘Precious genius’ Elon Musk love-bombs ‘beautiful’ Giorgia Meloni at think tank awards
“Musk, a maverick tech mogul who has riled regulators on both sides of the Atlantic and thrown his support behind Donald Trump in the upcoming U.S. presidential election, introduced [Italian Prime Minister Giorgia] Meloni in glowing terms — as ‘someone who is even more beautiful on the inside than she is on the outside’ and ‘authentic, honest and thoughtful.’ ‘That can’t always be said about politicians,’ Musk added, in a dig at Meloni's counterparts that was met with laughs from the crowd. The Italian leader, meanwhile, responded by praising Musk's ‘precious genius.’ Following Musk’s brief remarks — and a short embrace with the X and Tesla boss — the 47-year-old Meloni, who became Italy’s first female prime minister almost two years ago, used a 15-minute speech to espouse her vision of Western conservatism.”
-Suzanne Lynch, Politico
Musk says his companies are looking to invest in Argentina
“Elon Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, said in a post on X on Tuesday that his companies were looking for ways to invest in Argentina and support the South American nation. Argentina is the world's fourth-largest producer of lithium, a critical component of electric vehicle batteries. Musk has previously showed admiration for Argentine President Javier Milei's libertarian politics and his full-throated embrace of private enterprise. The billionaire hosted Milei at a Tesla factory in Austin, Texas, in April.”
-Kanjyik Ghosh, Reuters
September 21, 2024
"JD Vance suggested that the US may reconsider its support for NATO if the European Union pursued regulations targeting social media platforms, particularly Elon Musk's X. Vance made the remarks during a recent appearance on the "Shawn Ryan Show," where he expressed concerns about a perceived threat to free speech. Vance, Donald Trump's running mate in the upcoming presidential election, claimed on the show that an EU official had threatened to arrest Musk if he platformed Trump."
-Rebecca Rommen, Business Insider
The Fight Elon Musk Is Ready to Pick in a Trump Administration
"If Elon Musk becomes chief red-tape cutter in a second Trump administration, he is already giving a taste of what’s to come. His recent comments suggest the Federal Aviation Administration and Environmental Protection Agency would be where he directs scrutiny if he is put in charge of leading Donald Trump’s government efficiency commission, tasked with reducing government and regulations. On Tuesday, Musk said he planned to sue the FAA, claiming it was engaging in 'lawfare' and 'regulatory overreach' after seeking roughly $633,000 in fines against his rocket company, SpaceX, for alleged violations. Those comments followed similar critiques a week earlier of the EPA."
-Tim Higgins, The Wall Street Journal
Elon Musk’s X Backs Down in Brazil
Elon Musk suddenly appears to be giving up. After defying court orders in Brazil for three weeks, Mr. Musk’s social network, X, has capitulated. In a court filing on Friday night, the company’s lawyers said that X had complied with orders from Brazil’s Supreme Court in the hopes that the court would lift a block on its site…. Now, X’s lawyers said the company had done exactly what Mr. Musk vowed not to: take down accounts that a Brazilian justice ordered removed because the judge said they threatened Brazil’s democracy. X also complied with the justice’s other demands, including paying fines and naming a new formal representative in the country, the lawyers said.”
-Jack Nicas and Ana Ionova, The New York Times
Elon Musk, the Tesla billionaire who is one of the biggest bitcoin and crypto price influencers, has shared details of a secret meeting with El Salvador's bitcoin-backing president Nayib Bukele… Musk, who earlier this month backed a $36 trillion "by the end of 2024" warning over the spiraling interest payments on the huge U.S. national debt pile, revealed he and Bukele discussed the ‘future of humanity’ and technology, though he didn't mention bitcoin directly.”
-Billy Bambrough, Forbes
September 20, 2024
Elon Musk steps up political giving with six-figure donation to House Republicans
“Controversial tech magnate Elon Musk stepped up his political giving in August, giving his largest-known political donation ever to boost House Republicans’ efforts to preserve their vulnerable majority. The National Republican Congressional Committee reported receiving $289,100 from Musk in August, according to its report filed with the Federal Election Commission Friday. The money came through a joint fundraising committee linked to Rep. Ken Calvert (R-Calif.), the filing indicated, and most of it was earmarked for the NRCC’s convention and headquarters accounts, as is typical for donations of that amount.”
-Jessica Piper and Alex Isenstadt, Politico
US SEC intends to seek sanctions against Elon Musk in Twitter probe
“The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission said on Friday it intends to seek sanctions against Elon Musk after he failed to appear for court-ordered testimony for the regulator's probe into his $44 billion takeover of Twitter. In a filing in San Francisco federal court, the SEC said the sanctions motion would seek an order to show cause for why Musk should not be held in civil contempt for waiting until three hours before the scheduled Sept. 10 testimony to advise he would not show up.”
-Jonathan Stempel and Chris Prentice, Reuters
September 19, 2024
Secret Service Probing Musk’s Post About Threats to Biden and Harris
“The agency ‘is aware of the social media post made by Elon Musk,’ said Nate Herring, a spokesperson for the Secret Service. ‘As a matter of practice, we do not comment on matters involving protective intelligence. We can say, however, that the Secret Service investigates all threats related to our protectees.’ But don’t jump to any conclusions. I’ve written a handful of stories over the past eight years based on FOIA documents pertaining to prominent public figures who landed on the Secret Service’s radar. The worst that will likely happen if the Secret Service pays a visit to Musk is he’ll be inconvenienced and he’ll have to prove he doesn’t pose an imminent threat to President Joe Biden and Vice President Harris.”
-Jason Leopold and Dana Hull, Bloomberg
Elon Musk Has Turned X Into a Pressure Cooker
“On the day that Elon Musk announced his intention to buy Twitter in April 2022, I tried to game out how the acquisition might go. Three scenarios seemed plausible. There was a weird/chaotic timeline, where Musk actually tried to improve the platform, but mostly just floated harebrained schemes like putting tweets on the blockchain. There was a timeline where Musk essentially reverted Twitter to its founding ethos—one that had a naive and simplistic idea of real-time global conversation. And then there was the worst-case scenario: the dark timeline and its offshoot, the darkest-darkest timeline… Some 29 months later, this appears to be the timeline we’ve living in. But even my grim predictions failed to anticipate the intensity of Musk’s radicalization. He is no longer teasing at his anti-woke views or just asking questions to provoke a response. To call him a troll or a puckish court jester is to sugarcoat what’s really going on: Musk has become one of the chief spokespeople of the far right’s political project, and he’s reaching people in real time at a massive scale with his message.”
-Charlie Warzel, The Atlantic
Brazil fines Musk's X for site's return after ban
“Brazil has fined Elon Musk's companies after some users in the country were able to briefly access the social media platform X, despite a ban imposed last month. Brazilian users swarmed the site on Wednesday after X updated how its servers within the country were accessed. The platform’s restoration was unintended, the company said. Hours later access was again blocked. On Thursday, a Brazilian court fined the firm five million reais ($920,000; £695,000) for breaching the ban.”
-Ben Derico and Lily Jamali, BBC
September 18, 2024
"While top executives from Alphabet, Meta, and Microsoft headed to Capitol Hill on Wednesday for a hearing on election threats, Elon Musk’s X did not participate, according the office of the Senate Intelligence Committee chair. A representative for Sen. Mark R. Warner, the Democratic chair, said in an emailed statement that X ‘declined to send an appropriate witness.’ No further details were provided. A spokesperson for X told CNBC that the company’s invited witness was Nick Pickles, who had been the head of global affairs but ‘resigned on September 6.’ Warner’s office said X declined to send a replacement after Pickles’ departure.”
-Lora Kolodny and Jonathan Vanian, CNBC
How Elon Musk amplified content from a suspected Russian election interference plot
“As Elon Musk increasingly weighed in on politics in the last several years, he used his massive following on his social media app X to repeatedly amplify content from a company that appears to be at the center of an alleged Russian covert operation to manipulate U.S. public opinion ahead of the 2024 election. Musk, one of the world’s richest people, boosted content from creators and accounts tied to Tenet Media at least 60 times, resharing the operation’s posts and engaging in back-and-forth replies with Tenet’s paid pundits on X.”
-David Ingram, NBC News
Elon Musk boosts fake Trump rally bomb threat and false claims about the election
Elon Musk is using his social media platform to promote misinformation about the presidential candidates in the lead up to the November election, amplifying false claims Wednesday about a Trump rally bomb threat and immigrants eating pets in Ohio. While Musk’s posting of provocative, incendiary content on X is nothing new, the speed with which he has promoted false claims in recent days is striking given the breadth of Musk’s digital reach, with his posts regularly finding their way atop users’ feeds. The most prominent of Musk’s conspiratorial posts came in the wake of an alleged second assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump, after which Musk wrote in a now-deleted X post that “no one is even trying to assassinate Biden/Kamala.” After much backlash, Musk, who has pledged his support for Trump, ultimately deleted his post, stating that it was meant as a “joke.”
-Liam Reilly, CNN
Musk Finds a (Temporary) Way Around Brazil’s X Ban
On Wednesday, his social network, X, suddenly went live again for many across Brazil after three weeks of being blocked under orders from Brazil’s Supreme Court. The reason? X made a technical change to how it routes its internet traffic, enabling the site to evade the digital roadblocks set up in recent weeks by Brazilian internet providers. But by Wednesday night, the president of Brazil’s telecommunications regulator, Anatel, said his agency believed it would soon be able to restore the block.
-Jack Nicas, The New York Times
September 17, 2024
Elon Musk has often inflamed politically tense moments, raising worries for the US election
“Jocelyn Benson, Michigan’s Democratic secretary of state, said in an interview earlier this month that Musk’s election postings have created a ‘maelstrom of disinformation’ that makes it harder for those who run elections to empower voters with the facts. “I know the vast majority of election administrators just try to keep their heads down and do the work,” she said. ‘The challenge is, how do we get information about our work out to citizens, many of whom follow Musk or are members of X, or on the platform?’”
-Ali Swenson, Associated Press
Musk Pours Money into New York Races Critical to House GOP Win
“Elon Musk’s super political action committee is funneling $2.1 million to Republican candidates in battleground districts across the country, possibly helping the world’s richest person build a bench of allies in Congress. The group’s support could be key to determining whether Republicans hang onto their House majority after the November election.”
-Dana Hull, Bloomberg
September 16, 2024
Elon Musk Writes, Then Deletes, a Post Musing About Threats to Biden and Harris
“Hours after what the F.B.I. called a second attempted assassination of former President Donald J. Trump, Elon Musk wrote on his social media site — and then deleted — a post suggesting it was odd that nobody had tried to kill President Biden or Vice President Kamala Harris. Mr. Musk said the post on X had been intended as a joke.”
-Matthew Mpoke Bigg, The New York Times
September 15, 2024
Elon Musk’s pro-Trump super PAC ramps up swing state operations
“The committee, called America PAC, has spent nearly $33 million since it emerged from a summer spending lull in mid-August, far exceeding the amount it had spent to that date since its formation in late May, according to reports filed with the Federal Election Commission. Filings show the money has primarily funded get-out-the vote operations in battleground states including door-knocking, digital advertising and mailers. In recent days, America PAC has barraged voters in North Carolina with door-hangers and mail pieces. One mailer provided to The Washington Post calls Democratic nominee Kamala Harris ‘Radical. Liberal. Dangerous’ while describing Trump as the candidate who would “secure our border, restore law & order and lower costs for North Carolinians.’”
-Amy Gardner, Trisha Thadani and Clara Ence Morse, The Washington Post
September 14, 2024
Elon Musk’s Quest to Make Men Great Again
“Elon Musk is making things really clear: He is a Bro. He is such a Big Time Bro that this past week he tweeted an apparent offer to impregnate America’s Sweetheart, Taylor Swift, and publicly detailed a raunchy joke about male and female anatomy that he wanted to tell on national television. Before that, there was an X user’s post he amplified suggesting high-testosterone, alpha men were better equipped for parsing information than women and weak men. ‘That is why a Republic of high status males is best for decision making,’ the post read, to which Musk added: ‘Interesting observation.’ It is all part of his public embrace of an idea of tough-guy masculinity made popular through social-media memes—white, heterosexual males with money, power, success and female conquests. A public version of Musk has emerged that is warm to strong-man leaders and pushes back against what he describes as runaway political correctness hemming in men and their natural predilections.”
Tim Higgins, The Wall Street Journal
September 13, 2024
Brazil supreme court unfreezes assets of Elon Musk’s Starlink, X after taking fines
Brazil’s supreme court announced Friday that it ordered banks to transfer funds from Starlink and X accounts to pay fines the court levied against Elon Musk’s social network…. The court had nearly 18.4 million Brazilian reals, or approximately $3.3 million, transferred out of the accounts. Musk acquired X, then known as Twitter, in 2022. Starlink is the satellite internet service run by SpaceX. Following the transfers, the court ordered that the frozen bank accounts and assets of X and Starlink be released, saying there was no longer any need to keep them.
-Lora Kolodny, CNBC
“[Kate Conger]: There is this common perception of tech companies that they are these sort of neutral, faceless entities trying to keep their thumbs off the scale. Twitter’s always tried to maintain this middle ground where it’s a space for political conversation, but the platform has tried to stay in the shadows of that. We’re just here for whatever goes. Elon has very obviously and clearly broken that mold. I hope readers understand more clearly that this was, is and will be a tool for controlling political discourse and to think about it in that way. I really want to dispel the notion that any of these platforms hold a neutral stance.”
-Stuart Miller, The Los Angeles Times
September 12, 2024
Elon Musk calls Australian government ‘fascists’ over move to regulate online misinformation
“Elon Musk has called the Australian government ‘fascists’ over new legislation aimed at tackling deliberate lies spread on social media. Social media companies could be fined up to 5% of their annual turnover under the commonwealth’s proposed laws. Musk, the US billionaire who owns the social media platform X, formerly Twitter, responded to a post about Australia’s measures with one word. ‘Fascists,’ he wrote. But the federal minister Bill Shorten said Musk was inconsistent on free speech. ‘When it’s in his commercial interests, he is the champion of free speech; when he doesn’t like it, he’s going to shut it all down,’ he said on Channel Nine’s breakfast show on Friday.”
-Josh Taylor, The Guardian
How Elon Musk Secretly Tried to Oust a Texas Prosecutor
“Elon Musk secretly channeled hundreds of thousands of dollars into a local race in Travis County, Texas, in an unsuccessful effort to unseat a prosecutor who had won the office with the backing of the investor and Democratic donor George Soros. A group primarily funded by the Tesla and SpaceX chief executive, which called itself Saving Austin, sent out fliers and texts and spent more than $650,000 on television ads attacking District Attorney José Garza in the Democratic primary race earlier this year, according to people familiar with Musk’s involvement, as well as Federal Communications Commission filings and corporate documents. Musk, who is worth more than $200 billion and is the owner of a major social-media network, has used his influence and money to help Donald Trump return to the White House. His support for Trump marks a political shift that could have major ramifications in the presidential race. His covert effort in the local prosecutor’s race in Texas shows that his engagement in politics is broader than previously known.”
-Joe Palazzolo and Dana Mattioli, The Wall Street Journal
Elon Musk roasted by Meta’s Nick Clegg
“Top Meta exec and former British Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg tore into Elon Musk on Thursday, saying the tech mogul had turned X into ‘a sort of one man, sort of hyper-partisan and ideological hobby horse.’ In a wide-ranging talk at the Chatham House think tank in London, Clegg laid into Musk multiple times, contrasting Meta’s approach to content moderation with that adopted by X since Musk’s takeover.”
-Vincent Manancourt, Politico
September 11, 2024
Trump ally Elon Musk slams Harris: ‘We will never reach Mars if Kamala wins’
“A successful mission to Mars depends on the result of the U.S. presidential election in October, according to SpaceX chief and mega Republican booster Elon Musk. ‘Trump supports a government efficiency commission to allow great things to be done, Kamala does not,’ Musk said on X, adding, ‘We will never reach Mars if Kamala wins.’ Musk went wild on X, the social media platform he owns, in the hours following the first U.S. presidential debate in which Vice President Kamala Harris scored a clear win over former President Donald Trump, whom Musk supports.”
-Ketrin Jochecová, Politico
Elon Musk Tweeted a Disturbing Sexual Comment to, Apparently, Taylor Swift
When Taylor Swift signed off her endorsement of Kamala Harris in the 2024 election Tuesday evening by self-identifying as a ‘childless cat lady,’ in a jab at Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance, Elon Musk seems to have thought, well, I can change one of those things. ‘Fine Taylor … you win … I will give you a child and guard your cats with my life,’ he tweeted shortly after midnight Wednesday morning.”
-Kase Wickman, Vanity Fair
September 10, 2024
Elon Musk’s misleading election claims reach millions and alarm election officials
“Musk’s online utterances don’t stay online. His false and misleading election posts add to the deluge of inaccurate information plaguing voting officials across the country. Election officials say his posts about supposed voter fraud often coincide with an increase in baseless requests to purge voter rolls and heighten their worry over violent threats. Experts say Musk is uniquely dangerous as a purveyor of misinformation because his digital following stretches well beyond the political realm and into the technology and investment sectors, where his business achievements have earned him credibility.”
-Sarah Ellison, Amy Gardner and Clara Ence Morse
Elon Musk pushes unsubstantiated Arizona voter fraud claims
“Elon Musk — the world's richest man with one of the largest online microphones — is using his social media site X to question Arizona's election system. One of Maricopa County's top elections officials says Musk's recent posts and reposts are amplifying misinformation and false narratives about voter fraud. Election security has become one of the GOP's biggest talking points in Arizona and nationwide since former President Trump's 2020 loss — even though no legal challenges have successfully shown any proof of fraud or other election interference.”
-Jessica Boehm, Axios
September 8, 2024
Elon Musk on pace to become world’s first trillionaire by 2027, report says
“Elon Musk is on pace to become the world’s first trillionaire by 2027, according to a new report from a group that tracks wealth. Informa Connect Academy’s finding about the boss of electric carmaker Tesla, private rocket company SpaceX and social media platform X (formerly Twitter) stems from the fact that Musk’s wealth has been growing at an average annual rate of 110%. He was also the world’s richest person, with $251bn, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, as the academy’s 2024 Trillion Dollar Club report began circulating Friday.”
-Ramon Antonio Vargas, The Guardian
September 7, 2024
Elon Musk’s Pro-Trump PAC Ramps Up Advertising: ‘We Must STOP Kamala’
“Elon Musk’s America PAC is starting to fire up its digital ad campaign in support of Donald Trump’s presidential bid. The messages so far have been targeted at swing-state voters — and are anything but subtle. ‘If you sit this election out, Kamala and the crazies will win’” says an ad on Google’s YouTube, which has been shown at least three million times. ‘You will be stuck with higher costs and more illegals invading our country.’ It paints Trump, by contrast, as an ‘American Badass,’ with a video of the former president after the July assassination attempt that drove Musk to publicly support his candidacy.”
-Dana Hull, Biz Carson, and Bill Allison, Bloomberg
Brazilians Take to Streets to Protest Ban on Elon Musk’s X
“Tens of thousands of supporters of former President Jair Bolsonaro took to the streets of Brazil’s biggest city Saturday on the country’s Independence Day to rally against the government and protest the Supreme Court’s ban of Elon Musk’s social-media platform X. Scores of conservative politicians joined the demonstrations, many accusing the court of trying to censor the right-leaning opposition ahead of municipal elections on Oct. 6, when voters will pick mayors and local representatives in thousands of cities and towns.”
-Samantha Pearson, The Wall Street Journal
Donald Trump could turn Elon Musk into an American oligarch
“Former President Donald Trump’s plan to have Elon Musk lead a government efficiency commission would vault the world’s richest man to an unprecedented role: American oligarch. The details of the commission and Musk’s involvement are still vague, but any formal role in government would give greater influence to the billionaire owner of Tesla, Space X, satellite company Starlink and the social media platform X — signature ventures that have benefited from federal contracts, tax credits and government incentives.”
-Liz Crampton, Lara Korte, Derek Robertson and Brendan Bordelon, Politico
September 6, 2024
How Elon Musk Is Influencing Donald Trump
“Mr. Musk, the world’s richest man, has started to influence Mr. Trump as the Republican presidential nominee heads into November’s election. That the tech mogul has the ear of the candidate throws open what each can get out of an alliance — and creates a potential minefield. Their political friendship is particularly tricky because Mr. Musk has a sprawling set of businesses, which may present conflicts of interest if Mr. Trump is elected. Notably, Mr. Musk’s rocket maker, SpaceX, and his electric automaker, Tesla, have received billions of dollars in federal contracts and subsidies. Mr. Musk and some of his companies are also under scrutiny for various infractions from federal agencies including the Department of Justice, the Federal Trade Commission and the Securities and Exchange Commission.”
-Ryan Mac, Theodore Schleifer, and Maggie Haberman, The New York Times
September 5, 2024
Elon Musk Has the ‘Off’ Switch
“...Musk is becoming an internet god. Space-based internet and social media are a potent combination, and their control by a single person is quite unprecedented—and alarming in the same manner as a federal government restricting online speech via sweeping decree. Not only can Musk now determine who gains traction on a small but influential corner of the web; in certain corners of the globe, he can also determine who has access to the internet at all, and regulate what people encounter when they use it.”
-Marina Koren, The Atlantic
Trump to Tap Musk to Head Proposed Government Efficiency Commission
“Donald Trump outlined a suite of economic proposals in a speech here Thursday, including formally introducing a government efficiency commission to be headed by Elon Musk, cutting the corporate tax rate to 15% for companies that make products in the U.S. and creating a sovereign-wealth fund. He also said he would rescind certain unspent funds appropriated during the Biden administration and proposed barring people in the country illegally from obtaining a mortgage. The commission would conduct ‘a complete financial and performance audit of the entire federal government’ and make ‘recommendations for drastic reform,’ the Republican former president said in an appearance before the Economic Club of New York. The goal would be to identify ways to eliminate fraud and improper payments, Trump said.”
-Alex Leary and Richard Rubin, The Wall Street Journal
September 4, 2024
Brazil’s Pressure on X Causes Trouble for Musk’s Web of Businesses
“As X continues to battle governments around the world, and Musk expands his empire into new and ever-expanding industries, these types of clashes are bound to become more common. Any country that takes issue with Musk’s content decisions on X could theoretically get to him by going after Tesla, SpaceX or xAI. The more his companies are intertwined, the more legitimate those attacks will become. Musk’s universe of businesses has made him arguably the most powerful — and wealthiest — man in the world. Ironically, that same universe of businesses may ultimately become one of his biggest threats.”
-Kurt Wagner, Bloomberg
September 3, 2024
Elon Musk’s attacks on Kamala Harris become more unhinged, with help from AI
“By choosing to amplify disinformation and misogynist views, Musk, a South African billionaire who is both the owner of X and the most-followed account on the platform, is promoting radical content to the masses that might otherwise languish in the darkest corners of the internet. By Tuesday afternoon, less than 24 hours after Musk shared the fake image and false statement depicting Harris as a communist, the post had been viewed nearly 60 million times, according to data from X. Musk’s post suggesting women shouldn’t take part in democracy had been viewed more than 19 million times.”
-Donie O’Sullivan, CNN
No X in Brazil? No problem, Brazilians say.
“Last week’s imbroglio has made even more apparent the network’s growing weakness here. Justice Alexandre de Moraes, one of the world’s most aggressive prosecutors against misinformation, ordered X to block accounts that Moraes said were threatening democracy. The judge requested that Musk name a representative in Brazil to carry out judicial orders. Musk refused, Moraes suspended X — and Brazilians shrugged.”
-Terrence McCoy, The Washington Post
Musk’s Right-Wing Allies Seize on Brazil X Ban Heading Into Elections
“Brazil’s ban of social-media platform X may be an economic setback for owner Elon Musk, but it’s also a potential political opportunity for the billionaire and his right-wing allies. Since the network’s shutdown over the weekend, heated arguments about freedom of speech, fake news and online censorship have erupted in Brazil and the US — energizing conservative political movements just as they head into elections in both nations.”
-Daniel Carvalho and Andrew Rosati, Bloomberg
How Elon Musk Is Tying His Love for Trump to His Fight in Brazil
“In recent days, Musk’s Trump-backing has taken a more frenzied turn, with constant tweets about the need to reelect Trump, and warning of dire and increasingly farfetched consequences if he doesn’t retake office. He’s shared a lengthy series of stories about crimes supposedly committed by undocumented people, writing in one instance, ‘So many lives have been lost, because Democrat policies pander to the criminal clients. Criminals vote overwhelmingly Democrat, so they don’t want to lose their votes.’ In a continued fixation on migrants and crime, he’s also reshared posts from Chaya Raichik of the far-right Twitter account Libs of TikTok, in which she claims that ‘migrant gangs’ took over an apartment building in Colorado. (Aurora’s interim chief of police has denied that, telling a local ABC affiliate that ‘gang members have not taken over this complex.’) Musk has also directly linked his Brazilian feud with the need to defeat Kamala Harris, retweeting and agreeing with the account End Wokeness, who wrote, ‘Kamala supports what Brazil just did to X. How do I know? She wants to do it here.’”
-Anna Merlan, Mother Jones
Elon Musk’s Starlink Agrees to Block the X Social Network in Brazil
“Starlink, the satellite-internet service controlled by Elon Musk, reversed course on Tuesday and said it would comply with Brazilian government orders to block Mr. Musk’s social network X in the country. The move was the first sign of any backing down by Mr. Musk in Brazil since he began battling with the authorities there last month.”
-Jack Nicas
Brazil’s president says Elon Musk’s wealth doesn’t mean world has to accept his ‘far-right ideology’
“In an interview released Monday, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said his country’s stand against Musk—the richest person on the planet worth $239 billion per the Bloomberg Billionaires Index—should be an example to the rest of the world. ‘The world is not obliged to put up with Musk’s far-right ideology just because he is rich,’ Lula said in the interview with CNN Brasil.”
-Eleanor Pringle, Fortune
Elon Musk’s Sarcastic AI Image of Kamala Harris as ‘Communist Dictator’ Sparks Controversy on X
“The image, which portrays Harris as a communist ruler, was shared in response to Harris’s post criticizing Donald Trump’s alleged promises of authoritarian rule, in which she said he “vows to be a dictator on day 1.”
-Times of India staff reports
September 2, 2024
Elon Musk suggests support for replacing democracy with government of ‘high-status males’
Elon Musk has used his large platform on X to promote a theory that a free-thinking “Republic” could only exist under the decision-making of “high status males” – and women or “low T men” would not be welcome in it. On Sunday, Musk re-posted a screenshot of the theory – which appears to have been conceived on 4chan in 2021– on the social media site.
-Ariana Baio, The Independent
Brazilian Supreme Court Panel Upholds Order to Block Elon Musk’s X
“A panel of Brazilian Supreme Court justices voted on Monday to uphold a decision by one justice last week to block the social network X across the country because its owner, Elon Musk, refused to comply with court orders to suspend certain accounts. The five-justice panel voted unanimously to back the order, issuing strongly worded opinions saying that the blackout of X complied with Brazilian law and that it was necessary to enforce the nation’s rules against a foreign company that was flouting them.”
-Jack Nicas, The New York Times
Trump eyes plan that may give Elon Musk role in auditing U.S. agencies
“Behind closed doors, former president Donald Trump and his advisers have been talking for months about forming a commission led by prominent business executives to comb through the government books to identify thousands of programs to cut. Lately, one particularly famous candidate has made clear he’d be up for it: Elon Musk. And he may have much to gain personally from the endeavor.”
-Jeff Stein and Trisha Thadani, The Washington Post
September 1, 2024
How Elon Musk’s endorsement of Trump may have backfired
“Elon Musk’s endorsement of former President Donald Trump was meant to buoy the candidate’s chances in November. But more than a month after Musk officially put his weight behind Trump, a series of Democratic attacks have suggested that the endorsement has exposed a vulnerability… But as Trump’s poll numbers have sagged, Musk has shown signs of toning down his enthusiasm, if not outright signs of buyer’s remorse. Musk did not speak at the Republican National Convention, despite early discussions among Trump and his allies for him to do so.”
-David Ingram, NBC News
Musk’s Twitter investors have lost billions in value
“Based on a Washington Post analysis using Fidelity’s estimates, the eight largest initial investments that were reported to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission or otherwise publicly disclosed are worth about $5 billion less than when Musk bought X. His and his partners’ overall stake has shed $24 billion in value — a vaporization of wealth that has little parallel outside the realm of economic or industry-specific crashes, or devastating corporate scandals.”
-Faiz Siddiqui, The Washington Post
August 30, 2024
Brazilian Justice orders complete block of X in Brazil
“A Supreme Court Justice ordered, on Friday, the complete suspension of all access to X (formerly Twitter) across the entire Brazilian territory, in an unprecedented ruling against the social platform. In the petition, the Justice, Alexandre de Moraes, ordered the president of Brazil's telecom regulator, Anatel, Carlos Manuel Baigorri, to ensure that necessary measures are taken and that internet companies are notified to block the application within 24 hours. Moraes also said that Apple and Google need to ‘implement technological barriers that would make it impossible’ to use X and VPN applications in Brazil. The block of X/Twitter is not immediate, and internet service providers may take up to one business day after receiving the notice to implement the block.”
-Sérgio Spagnuolo, Sofia Schurig, and Pedro Nakamura, Núcleo Jornalismo
Brazil Blocks X After Musk Ignores Court Orders
“Brazil blocked the social network X on Friday after its owner, Elon Musk, refused to comply with a Brazilian judge’s orders to suspend certain accounts, the biggest test yet of the billionaire’s efforts to transform the site into a digital town square where just about anything goes. Alexandre de Moraes, a Brazilian Supreme Court justice, ordered Brazil’s telecom agency to block access to X across the nation of 200 million because the company lacked a necessary legal representative in Brazil.”
-Jack Nicas and Kate Conger, The New York Times
Brazilian judge orders suspension of X in dispute with Elon Musk
“In Moraes’s order Friday, a copy of which was obtained by The Washington Post, he directs Brazil’s telecommunications agency and internet providers to block users here from accessing X and gives Apple and Google five days to prevent downloads of its app. Google declined to comment. Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment.”
-Terrence McCoy, Trisha Thadani, and Marina Dias, The Washington Post
Elon Musk says voting by mail is ‘insane’ — but he has done it himself, records show
“Elon Musk has attacked voting by mail as an ‘insane’ idea that encourages election fraud, but he voted by mail twice when he lived in California, according to records of his voting history obtained by NBC News. Musk voted by mail in November 2016, the year Donald Trump defeated Hillary Clinton, and in the November 2018 midterm election, the records show. Musk’s primary residence was in Los Angeles at the time.”
-David Ingram, NBC News
Musk's X Repeats It Will Not Comply with Court Orders and Expects to Be Blocked in Brazil
“The social network X (formerly Twitter), owned by Elon Musk, stated on Thursday night (29) that it will not comply with orders from Minister Alexandre de Moraes of the Supreme Federal Court and said it expects to be blocked in Brazil. The company's statement was released seven minutes after the deadline set by Moraes (8:07 PM) for it to appoint a legal representative in Brazil.”
-Folha de S.Paulo
August 29, 2024
Musk ramps up attacks on Brazil’s top judge as X faces possible suspension, Starlink finances frozen
“Tesla, SpaceX and X Corp. leader Elon Musk ramped up his online attacks on Brazilian Supreme Court justice Alexandre de Moraes on Thursday, amid an intensifying political and legal battle between the tech billionaire and his companies, and Brazil’s highest court… On Wednesday night, Musk posted a manipulated image that appeared to show the judge behind bars. ‘One day, @Alexandre, this picture of you in prison will be real. Mark my words,’ Musk wrote to de Moraes and Musk’s 195.8 million listed followers on X.”
-Lora Kolodny, CNBC
Explainer: What is Elon Musk's feud with a Brazilian Supreme Court justice about?
“Justice Alexandre de Moraes and Musk have been in a public feud for months, after X failed to comply with legal orders to block certain accounts accused of spreading ‘fake news’ and hate messages. X, formerly known as Twitter, claims Moraes threatened to arrest one of the company's legal representatives in Brazil if it did not comply. Musk's platform has shut all of its Brazil offices due to what it called ‘censorship’ by the judge, though its service has remained available for users in the country.”
-Anthony Boadle, Reuters
X flags NPR story on Trump, Arlington as unsafe
“The social platform X flagged a story from NPR that outlined the fallout of a reported clash between Trump campaign staffers and Arlington National Cemetery officials earlier this week as potentially ‘unsafe.’”
-Dominick Mastrangelo, The Hill
August 28, 2024
Brazil Threatens to Ban Elon Musk’s X
“Brazil’s Supreme Court on Wednesday gave Elon Musk 24 hours to name a legal representative for X in Brazil or face a ban of his social network across the nation of 200 million. Mr. Musk closed X’s office in Brazil last week in protest of orders from a Brazilian Supreme Court justice to suspend certain accounts. If X refuses to comply, it could lose access to one of its largest markets outside the United States — a blow as the company struggles to regain revenue after Mr. Musk battled with advertisers and told them not to spend on the platform. The court posted its order on X on Wednesday night, suggesting that Mr. Musk had until about 8 p.m. local time Thursday to respond.”
-Kate Conger and Jack Nicas, The New York Times
Elon Musk, Eyeing Edge for Trump, Hires Republican Political Adviser
“Elon Musk, the world’s richest person, has hired a Republican operative with expertise in field organizing to help steer his political work, a move that suggests that Mr. Musk is preparing to become even more involved in Republican politics and get-out-the-vote efforts specifically. Chris Young, most recently a senior political official at PhRMA, the trade association of the pharmaceutical industry that does some grass-roots organizing, is joining Mr. Musk’s team, according to three people briefed on the move.”
-Theodore Scheifer, The New York Times
August 27, 2024
Lawmakers call for crackdown on AI deepfakes after Grok backlash
“A group of Democratic lawmakers are pushing the Federal Election Commission (FEC) to increase regulation on artificial intelligence (AI) deepfakes following the release of the social platform X’s chatbot Grok. In a Monday letter to the FEC, Rep. Shontel Brown (D-Ohio) and a handful of other House members asked the regulatory agency to clarify whether AI-generated deepfakes of election candidates are classified as ‘fraudulent misrepresentation.’”
-Miranda Nazzaro, The Hill
August 26, 2024
Elon Musk backs California bill to regulate AI
“Elon Musk on Monday voiced his support for one of the most polarizing artificial intelligence policy proposals in the nation, backing a California bill that would require large-scale models to undergo safety testing. Senate Bill 1047 has been lambasted by tech giants like Marc Andreessen and OpenAI for what they say are vague and burdensome regulations that would have a chilling effect on open-sourced models.”
-Lara Korte, Politico
Judge Blocks Missouri AG’s Elon-Inspired Censorial Vindictive ‘Investigation’ Into Media Matters
“Yet another federal judge has blocked a censorial, vindictive government ‘investigation’ into Media Matters for having the temerity to report on seeing ads on ExTwitter showing up next to neo-Nazi content.”
-Mike Masnick, TechDirt
“X owner Elon Musk has sprung to the defense of the founder of controversial messaging app Telegram, calling for the 39-year-old to be released from French custody… Musk’s X is likewise in the crosshairs of European policymakers, with the EU Commission recently reminding him of its failure to observe the Digital Services Act that requires large platform owners to systematically clamp down on false and misleading content.”
-Christiaan Hetzner, Fortune
August 25, 2024
Elon Musk’s Hard Turn to Politics, in 300,000 of His Own Words
“To understand the political evolution of one of the world’s richest men, the Journal captured nearly 42,000 of Musk’s exchanges on X between 2019 and the end of July. (That’s nearly all his conversations during that period, with a small number of exceptions, such as posts he deleted. Read here for more on methodology.) Musk’s exchanges included roughly 76,000 posts—his tweets as well as his retweets, tweets to which he replied and any quoted tweets. The Journal mapped them using the same technology that powers artificial intelligence tools like ChatGPT.”
-Andrea Fuller, Alexa Corse, John West and Kara Dapena, The Wall Street Journal
Trump says Musk wouldn't have time to be in his White House cabinet, but could 'consult'
“Former President Donald Trump said that Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk likely couldn’t serve in his hypothetical White House cabinet due to the demanding schedule of running his various companies. Trump’s comment gives him a potential exit ramp from his newly formed alliance with Musk if he wins the November election against Democratic nominee Kamala Harris.”
-Rebecca Picciotto, CNBC
Will Elon Musk’s Infatuation With Trump Backfire? History Says Yes
“Like all American citizens, Musk and other CEOs have the right to get involved in American politics, from funding super PACs to working behind the scenes to drum up the vote to giving them an audience on their platforms. But that engagement can come at a cost. History provides a note of caution: TIME founder Henry Luce fully invested himself in promoting the campaign of General Dwight Eisenhower. His full-throated support of Eisenhower, unusual for a media conglomerate, brought short-term benefits — giving him access to Eisenhower in the White House. But ultimately, his enthusiastic embrace of Eisenhower had a detrimental impact on his magazine’s journalistic reputation.”
-Tevi Troy, Politico
August 23, 2024
Elon Musk’s Lawyers Quietly Subpoena Public Interest Groups
“Lawyers representing Elon Musk and X, previously known as Twitter, have quietly begun sending subpoenas to a host of public interest groups, Mother Jones has learned. Most of the targeted organizations have signed open letters to X’s advertisers expressing concerns about the platform’s direction under Musk’s leadership. The groups include the Center for Countering Digital Hate, the Union of Concerned Scientists, the digital rights organization Access Now, and Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR). The subpoenas represent a new chapter in the legal war Musk launched after advertisers fled X, and are part of a lawsuit Musk and X first filed about a year ago against Media Matters over a report it published documenting that ads appeared alongside extremist content.”
-Anna Merlan, Mother Jones
August 22, 2024
Elon Musk's America PAC tries to persuade states to drop voter registration investigations
“Elon Musk’s America PAC is trying to persuade election officials in Michigan and North Carolina to back off their investigations of its voter registration practices. And the political action committee may have succeeded at least in part, as Michigan says it hasn’t found evidence of any violations of state campaign finance law but will continue to monitor the situation.”
-David Ingram, NBC News
August 21, 2024
Elon Musk’s X reveals investors in court filing
“Shareholders named in the document include some of Silicon Valley’s most prominent venture capitalists and entrepreneurs — as well as a fund linked with hip-hop mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs. The filing lists nearly 100 entities with a stake in X, although many appear to represent different funds controlled by the same firm or person. Other investors include venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal al Saud; Twitter founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey; and 8VC, a venture capital firm co-founded by Joe Lonsdale, co-founder of intelligence contractor and data analysis platform Palantir.”
-Trisha Thadani, The Washington Post
X discloses some details about Trump-Musk interview promos
“Former president Donald Trump’s campaign paid more than $40,000 to promote posts on X tied to his interview with Elon Musk, but details about his arrangements with the company remain scant, your co-host Cristiano Lima-Strong reports for Tech Brief… Campaign watchdog groups said the episode put a spotlight on how tech companies have been left to self-police transparency in the U.S. political ad space because of limited regulations. Spokespeople for X and the Trump campaign did not return requests for comment last week.”
-Cristiano Lima/Will Oremus, The Washington Post
August 20, 2024
“Musk and his companies have filed at least 23 lawsuits in federal courts alone since July of 2023, a Fortune analysis of federal court records shows. Combined with state suits, Musk, Tesla, X, and SpaceX have sued competitors, start-ups, law firms, watchdog groups, individuals, the state of California, federal agencies, and popstar Grimes, who is the mother of three of his children. Musk has been so legally aggressive that one judge decided his litigation was more about revenge than justice: 'This case is about punishing the Defendants for their speech,' the judge said. In interviews with Fortune, law professors who have studied Musk said the lawsuits display a combative, often retaliatory approach toward litigation. In cases against small nonprofits that have criticized his content moderation policies on X, as well as suits against the Department of Justice and National Labor Relations Board relating to his treatment of employees, Musk frequently goes on the offensive when his business practices are challenged by outsiders.”
-Seamus Webster, Fortune
Elon Musk's Response After Trump Says He Would Make Him Adviser
“After US Presidential candidate Donald Trump said that he might consider offering Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk an advisory role within his administration, the latter responded with a social media post that read, ‘I am willing to serve.’ The post features Mr Musk standing in front of a podium emblazoned with the words ‘Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).’ The acronym is a playful nod to Dogecoin, the popular cryptocurrency that originated as a meme.”
-Samiran Mishra, NDTV
August 19, 2024
Trump says he would offer Tesla CEO Elon Musk a Cabinet slot, but might end EV tax credit
“Former President Donald Trump on Monday said he would offer Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk a Cabinet position or an advisory role in his administration if he wins a second term in the White House. Trump told Reuters in an interview that he would tap Musk for such a position ‘if he would do it.’”
-Kevin Brueninger, CNBC
August 18, 2024
Inciting rioters in Britain was a test run for Elon Musk. Just see what he plans for America
"In Britain, the canary has sung. This summer we have witnessed something new and unprecedented. The billionaire owner of a tech platform publicly confronting an elected leader and using his platform to undermine his authority and incite violence. Britain’s 2024 summer riots were Elon Musk’s trial balloon. He got away with it. And if you’re not terrified by both the extraordinary supranational power of that and the potential consequences, you should be. If Musk chooses to “predict” a civil war in the States, what will that look like? If he chooses to contest an election result? If he decides that democracy is over-rated? This isn’t sci-fi. It’s literally three months away.”
-Carole Cadwalladr, The Guardian
Elon Musk Closes X Operations in Brazil Over Fight With Judge
“Elon Musk said he closed the Brazilian office of his social network X on Saturday because a Brazilian Supreme Court judge ordered the company to suspend certain accounts or face the arrest of its legal representative in Brazil. X said its service would remain available to users in Brazil. The company did not say how many people it employed in Brazil.”
-Jack Nicas, The New York Times
August 17, 2024
Elon Musk’s rightward turn includes a fringe fascination: Civil war
“Tech billionaire Elon Musk has repeatedly prophesied a future civil war related to immigration. Musk has posted about the subject on his social media platform X at least eight times in the past 10 months, according to a review of his posts by NBC News. And his posts usually include a specific prediction: He thinks that Europe in particular is headed toward a 'civil war' due to the arrival of refugees from other continents.”
-David Ingram, NBC News
A week in tweets: Elon Musk doesn’t stop posting but what is he saying?
“Musk’s agitation over the UK riots seems to have deepened his association with the far right. Over the past week, he has struck up a conversation with the Canadian influencer Lauren Southern, one of three anti-Islam activists who were banned from entering the UK by Theresa May’s government in 2018. As well as chatting about their shared distrust of the media, Musk is now a paid subscriber to her feed, supporting her for £4.92 a month, as he does with more than 160 other users.”
-Alex Hern, The Guardian
August 16, 2024
Elon Musk said he’d eliminate bots from X. Instead, election influence campaigns are running wild
“As X has pulled back from fighting influence operations, the stakes for democracies have only grown. Eighty-two countries will see elections at some point in 2024, including giants like India, South Africa, and Mexico, as well as smaller nations like Rwanda and Sri Lanka that are easily overlooked by moderators. X doesn’t wield influence in all of those countries, but in places where it does, the platform’s indifference to moderation has left democracy alarmingly vulnerable. Organizations that monitor for influence operations globally have already cataloged several other ongoing campaigns, mostly focused on regions where X remains influential. In only the past six months, the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab) has registered influence campaigns aimed at discrediting Georgian protestors and spreading confusion around the death of an Egyptian economist — both powered by inauthentic X accounts. Chinese-language spambots have continued to flood sensitive search terms on X, effectively suppressing and harassing dissident Chinese groups on the platform.”
-Russell Brandom, Rest of World
Noxious images spread after Elon Musk launches AI tool with few guardrails
“A flurry of provocative artificial intelligence-generated content has spread across Elon Musk’s social media platform X, including fake images of Vice President Kamala Harris suggestively eating fruit, former president Donald Trump cradling a pregnant Harris’s stomach and hyper-realistic images of chisel-jawed men brandishing Nazi signs. The images stem from new tools on the site that allow users to quickly create photorealistic visuals using a built-in chatbot called Grok, which Musk touted in a post this week as the ‘most fun AI in the world!’”
-Trisha Thadani, Pranshu Verma and Nitasha Tiku, The Washington Post
August 15, 2024
Musk’s Support for Far-Right Voices Is Sowing Discord in Europe
“Even before protestors took to the streets in the UK, the billionaire was responding to a broad array of right-wing European agitators, including Dutch anti-climate activists, Austrian ethnonationalists and an (anonymous) anti-immigrant campaigner from Italy known for spreading dubious claims about various minority groups. And when I say responding, I don’t mean he was doing the good work of fact-checking them. Musk’s actions have lent weight and considerable attention to fringe ideologies, which would have once struggled to gain purchase in Europe’s more staid political traditions. With 194 million followers on X, anything Musk engages with will find a much larger audience than it would otherwise get.”
-Daniel Zuidijk, Bloomberg
Elon Musk’s AI photo tool is generating realistic, fake images of Trump, Harris and Biden
“Elon Musk’s AI chatbot Grok on Tuesday began allowing users to create AI-generated images from text prompts and post them to X. Almost immediately, people began using the tool to flood the social media site with fake images of political figures such as former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, as well as of Musk himself — some depicting the public figures in obviously false but nonetheless disturbing situations, like participating in the 9/11 attacks.”
-Claire Duffy, CNN
August 14, 2024
Former X employees, experts doubt Musk claim of cyberattack on Trump talk
“Former engineers at X and outside experts cast further doubt Tuesday on Elon Musk’s claim that a 40-minute delay in his Monday audio conversation with Donald Trump was caused by a ‘massive’ cyberattack. Musk said Monday that the technical glitches that stopped the heavily promoted episode on Spaces, X’s live audio platform, from starting on time were because of a distributed denial of service, or DDoS, attack, in which many devices send meaningless data at once to overwhelm an offering. A senior engineer at X told an outside expert late Tuesday that there had been no evidence of an attack, the expert relayed to The Washington Post.”
-Joseph Menn, The Washington Post
Trump-Elon Musk interview violated campaign finance regulations, Democratic PAC claims
“A Democratic political action committee has filed a complaint against former President Donald Trump and the social media site X, formerly known as Twitter, alleging that an Aug. 12 interview between Trump and X owner Elon Musk violated Federal Election Commission regulations… The PAC, End Citizens United, alleges that Musk’s advocacy for Trump’s campaign and his use of company resources to resolve the livestream’s tech glitch amounted to an illegal corporate campaign contribution.”
-Maya Homan, USA Today
August 13, 2024
Brussels slaps down Thierry Breton over ‘harmful content’ letter to Elon Musk
“Brussels has accused its internal market commissioner of going rogue by sending a letter to Elon Musk threatening punishment if content posted on social media site X was found to place EU citizens at risk of ‘serious harm’... On Tuesday the European Commission denied Breton had approval from its president Ursula von der Leyen to send the letter. ‘The timing and the wording of the letter were neither co-ordinated or agreed with the president nor with the [commissioners],’ it said. An EU official, who asked not to be named, said: ‘Thierry has his own mind and way of working and thinking.’”
-Alice Hanccok, The Financial Times
EU takes shot at Musk over Trump interview — and misses
“The European Union’s top digital enforcer tried to take on Elon Musk. Within hours, he faced accusations of meddling in American politics and his own staff were back-pedalling hard."
-Mark Scott, Politico
How X owner Elon Musk uses his social platform to amplify his right-wing views
“As X’s owner and most followed user, Elon Musk has increasingly used the social media platform as a megaphone to amplify his political views and, lately, those of right-wing figures he’s aligned with. There are few modern parallels to his antics, but then again there are few modern parallels to Elon Musk himself.”
-Barbara Ortutay, The Associated Press
Elon Musk Throws a Trump Rally
“After an hour of technical difficulties, the resulting ‘X Space’ was something of a digital Trump rally—the former president ranting, as if on the stump, about the recent attempt on his life, the price of bacon, border security, and ‘nuclear warming,’ with gentle, stammering interjections from Musk. For two men obsessed with spectacle, the conversation violated the first rule of attention-seeking: It was meandering and tedious, lacking drama or friction, and Musk’s doormat approach meant that Trump was free to filibuster and lie without interruption—offering up the kind of non sequiturs and irrelevant information that bore even his most loyal supporters. When Trump exhausted himself, Musk, cued only by the awkward silence, would offer his agreement and gingerly pivot to a new topic.”
-Charlie Warzel, The Atlantic
Texas judge steps aside in Elon Musk's X case against advertisers
“A U.S. District Judge in Texas has recused himself from a lawsuit filed by Elon Musk’s X days after NPR drew scrutiny to the judge’s investment in Tesla and questions about Musk using the court to engage in ‘forum-shopping’ … In November, Musk’s X sued watchdog group Media Matters over reports the group released highlighting white nationalist content appearing next to brands that advertised on the platform. In that case, O’Connor has issued sweeping rulings in favor of Musk, including granting Musk’s lawyers wide latitude to request hundreds of pages of documents from the nonprofit, a process known as legal discovery.”
-Bobby Allyn, NPR
Elon Musk’s surging political activism
"Beyond the self-serving speciousness of Maduro’s actions, his concerns about Musk’s propensity to meddle in politics and the affairs of nations are not without foundation. Since Musk acquired Twitter, in 2022—and rebranded it as X, a year ago—the onetime libertarian multibillionaire has increasingly propagated far-right viewpoints. He endorsed a post on X promoting an antisemitic conspiracy theory, shared a since-deleted link to unsubstantiated claims involving the attack on Nancy Pelosi’s husband, and said that 'the Biden-Harris Administration is importing vast numbers of voters.' Musk’s interventions in global politics extend beyond his bully pulpit at X; he has played an ambiguous role in Ukraine, allowing Kyiv to use his Starlink satellite system but opposing the Biden Administration’s policy toward the war. But he has escalated his use of his social-media platform this year on behalf of foreign leaders, including Argentina’s self-described 'anarcho-capitalist' Javier Milei and Brazil’s former ultra-rightist President Jair Bolsonaro, both admirers of Donald Trump."
-Jon Lee Anderson, The New Yorker
August 12, 2024
Trump Regales Elon Musk With Familiar Falsehoods
“Former President Donald J. Trump repeated a number of inaccurate claims that have become campaign staples in a conversation on Monday night with the billionaire Elon Musk on X, his social media platform.”
-Linda Qiu, The New York Times
EU’s Breton warns Musk on hate speech ahead of Trump interview; receives profane response
“The European Union's digital enforcer wrote an open letter to tech mogul Elon Musk on Monday ahead of a planned interview with former United States President Donald Trump to remind him of the EU’s rules on promoting hate speech… Responding to Breton, Musk tweeted out a meme containing the words: ‘Take a big step back and literally, fuck your own face!’”
-Seb Starcevic, Politico
Trump Returns to X in Victory for Elon Musk
“Donald J. Trump posted on X Monday morning, handing a victory to Elon Musk, the social media platform’s owner, who for months has urged the former president to use the site again… Mr. Trump’s return to X after nearly a year of silence could provide a needed boost to the platform, which has faced increased competition from a rash of new social media platforms, including the former president’s Truth Social. X has also struggled to overcome skepticism from advertisers, especially after Mr. Musk sued an influential advertising coalition last week. But if Mr. Trump returns as a power user of the site, which helped fuel his political rise, it could attract new interest from political advertisers.”
-Kate Conger, The New York Times
Inside Elon Musk’s Hands-On Push to Win 800,000 Voters for Trump
“Musk is tackling the election effort in his signature hands-on, chaos-be-damned style, echoing his 2022 takeover of Twitter and early efforts to meet Tesla’s production goals. Whether he and the team he has assembled succeed could be an important part of the election puzzle, and some Republican political operatives said they fear the early stumbles could be costly for the Trump campaign. The recent overhaul means America PAC, formed in May, is resetting about a month before early voting starts and fewer than 90 days before the presidential election. But the super PAC’s new leadership is confident it can execute the group’s mandate and the Trump camp has expressed support for the recent changes.”
-Dana Mattioli, Joe Palazzolo, and Emily Glazer, The Wall Street Journal
Elon Musk should face arrest if he incited UK rioters, says ex-Twitter chief
“Elon Musk should face ‘personal sanctions’ and even the threat of an ‘arrest warrant’ if found to be stirring up public disorder on his social media platform, a former Twitter executive has said. It cannot be right that the billionaire owner of X, and other tech executives, be allowed to sow discord without personal risks, Bruce Daisley, formerly Twitter’s vice-president for Europe, Middle East and Africa, writes in the Guardian. He said the prime minister, Keir Starmer, should ‘beef up’ online safety laws and reflect on whether the media regulator, Ofcom, ‘is fit to deal with the blurringly fast actions of the likes of Musk.’”
-Carolyn Davies, The Guardian
August 11, 2024
Elon Musk’s X feed becomes megaphone for his far-right politics
“Musk’s openly partisan participation on the site he bought in October 2022 reflects a broader evolution in his public persona from business-minded tech prodigy to right-wing firebrand. It has also raised questions about Musk’s intentions for the social networking site, which he said he purchased to promote free speech and a more open exchange of ideas. In some ways, the site has become a personal megaphone for his provocative political views.”
-Faiz Siddiqui and Jeremy B. Merrill, The Washington Post
August 9, 2024
Elon Musk and the danger to democracy
“In the last few days, he has commented repeatedly on the racist riots in Britain. He has forecast a coming UK civil war, condemned Britain’s prime minister Sir Keir Starmer for alleged bias towards non-whites and implied that Britain’s immigration policies were responsible for the murder of three girls last week in Southport. Posts by figures who were banned under Twitter’s previous ownership, such as Tommy Robinson, a fringe and four-times-jailed extreme right British activist, have gone viral. On Thursday, Musk promoted another far right British figure — Ashlea Simon, co-founder of Britain First, also a white supremacist splinter group — who claimed Starmer planned to send British rioters to detention camps in the Falkland Islands. Simon’s post cited a fake Daily Telegraph story carrying that headline, a story the Telegraph quickly pointed out was invented. Musk deleted his tweet but only after it had made about 2mn impressions and with no apology for his error.”
-Edward Luce, Financial Times
Britain’s riots put spotlight on far-right misinformation
“Rather than reckoning with the toxic misinformation enabled by his platform, Musk seemed to encourage it, boosting the hysteria of far-right commentators and adding his own. He remarked that 'civil war is inevitable' in Britain and accused the Labour prime minister of being unduly harsh on the far-right protesters. Musk’s animosity here is hardly new. Under his watch, X has reactivated a host of incendiary, oft-racist accounts, some of which played a role in fanning the flames last week.”
-Ishaan Tharoor, Washington Post
Elon Musk’s journey from humanitarian to poster of rightwing memes
“Once, the chief executive of one of the world’s largest companies approvingly sharing a fabricated headline published by the leadership of a fascist party would have been news. For Elon Musk, it was just Thursday.”
-Alex Hern, The Guardian
August 8, 2024
Elon Musk's misleading election claims have accrued 1.2 billion views on X, new analysis says
“False or misleading claims about the U.S. election that Elon Musk has posted to X this year have generated nearly 1.2 billion views, according to an analysis published Thursday by the nonprofit Center for Countering Digital Hate. Researchers from the center said they identified 50 instances this year when Musk posted election claims that have been debunked by independent fact-checkers but spread widely on the app anyway.”
-David Ingram, NBC News
August 7, 2024
North Carolina investigating Elon Musk's new pro-Trump PAC
“Multiple state agencies are looking into whether a political action committee backing former Republican President Donald Trump, and backed by the world’s richest person, has been committing civil or criminal violations in North Carolina. Elections officials have launched an investigation into the allegations, which revolve around claims that America PAC falsely told North Carolinians it was registering them to vote, a spokesman for the State Board of Elections confirmed Wednesday…. America PAC is backed by Tesla Chief Executive Elon Musk, who tops the Forbes list of world billionaires, as well as several other wealthy tech industry insiders.”
-Will Doran, WRAL News
Elon Musk Has Turned X Into His Personal Political Playground
“Ahead of the US elections, Elon Musk, the billionaire owner of X, has used the platform as his own personal political bullhorn…. Former Twitter trust and safety employees say that Musk’s increasingly partisan behavior around the US elections and other major events is a sign that he is doing exactly what he accused the company’s former leadership of doing: playing politics.”
-Vittoria Elliott, WIRED
Trump announces ‘major interview’ with Elon Musk
“Former United States President and Republican nominee Donald Trump will sit down with tech billionaire Elon Musk for an interview next week, he said Tuesday.”
-Seb Starcevic, Politico
Trump strikes softer tone on EVs after Musk endorsement
“Former President Trump has softened his tone on electric vehicles (EVs) following his backing from Tesla’s Elon Musk. Over the weekend, Trump said, ‘I’m for electric cars. I have to be, because Elon endorsed me very strongly. So I have no choice.’”
-Rachel Frazin, The Hill
It’s Elon Musk’s X and governments are having to live with it
“The biggest spreader of political divisiveness and incendiary posts on Elon Musk’s revamped Twitter is turning out to be Musk himself. In just the last two weeks on the platform — since rebranded X — the billionaire provocateur unloaded a string of posts that poured fuel on the fire of Britain’s worst anti-immigration riots in decades; shared a doctored video of Vice President Kamala Harris deeming herself the ’ultimate diversity hire’ for president; and claimed without evidence that the Biden-Harris administration is ‘importing vast numbers’ of illegal aliens to swing the November election.”
-John Sakellariadis, Christine Mui, and Brittany Gibson, Politico
August 6, 2024
Elon Musk Is Helping Fuel the Flames of Far-Right Rioting on X
“Instead of condemning the violence spurred on partly by his own platform, Musk appears to be squaring up for a fight…. The UK government has already condemned the world's richest person over a comment he posted claiming ‘civil war is inevitable’ below a video of the far-right disorder. Downing Street said there was ‘no justification’ for the comments and called on social media companies to do more about the spread of misinformation. Musk later hit back at Prime Minister Kier Starmer for commenting that attacks on mosques or Muslim communities would not be tolerated, asking: ‘Shouldn't you be concerned about attacks on all communities?’"
-Beatrice Nolan, Business Insider
August 5, 2024
Musk's AI chatbot spread election misinformation, secretaries of state say
“Five secretaries of state sent a letter to Elon Musk Monday imploring him to fix X's AI chatbot after it shared misinformation about the 2024 presidential election.”
-Ivana Saric, Axios
Elon Musk’s X Is Helping Trump Lie About Kamala
“Another deepfake of Harris gained momentum after Musk himself shared a doctored audio recording of Harris on July 27 in which she appears to say she’s ‘the ultimate diversity hire’ and accuses anyone of not voting for her as ‘sexist’ and ‘racist.’ ‘This is amazing,’ Musk wrote alongside a laughing emoji, disseminating the fake audio to his 192 million followers with zero additional context.”
-Ellie Quinlan Houghtaling, The New Republic
August 4, 2024
Elon Musk PAC being investigated by Michigan secretary of state for potential violation
“A political action committee backed by billionaire Elon Musk is being investigated by the Michigan secretary of state’s office amid efforts to collect voter data. Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, has said he created and helped fund the America PAC, which is supporting former President Donald Trump. Musk has a net worth of over $225 billion, according to Forbes.”
-Brian Schwartz, CNBC
Secretaries of state urge Musk to fix AI chatbot spreading false election info
“Five secretaries of state plan to send an open letter to billionaire Elon Musk on Monday, urging him to ‘immediately implement change’” to X’s AI chatbot Grok, after it shared with millions of users false information suggesting that Kamala Harris was not eligible to appear on the 2024 presidential ballot.”
-Sarah Ellison and Amy Gardner, The Washington Post
August 2, 2024
How an Elon Musk PAC is using voter data to help Trump beat Harris in 2024 election
“The combination of owning a social media company that gives him an enormous platform to push his political views, and creating a PAC with effectively unlimited resources, has made Musk, for the first time, a major force in an American presidential election.”
-Brian Schwartz, CNBC
August 1, 2024
Elon Musk Says He Would Recognize a Harris Election Victory
“The tech billionaire’s support of Trump and dog whistles about interference—all those imagined imported voters—invites the possibility that he could be an influential voice in resisting a Harris victory. His posts make it easy to think he might join in encouraging open revolt, even violence, if MAGA supporters are once again egged on by Trump—he could also actively suppress counter-perspectives through his control of the X platform, if he so desires.”
-Damon Beres, The Atlantic
Elon Musk is taking a larger role in the election. Can he influence voters?
“Less than a week after Elon Musk publicly endorsed the candidacy of former President Donald Trump, he shared an edited video of Vice President Kamala Harris that used artificial intelligence to mimic her voice. Musk, the wealthiest person in the world, spread the video on his social media platform X, where he boasts 192 million followers. The post appeared to violate X policies that disallow sharing ‘synthetic, manipulated or out-of-context media.’ Later, Musk defended the video as parody, which is permitted on the platform when adequately labeled. A similar firestorm broke out this week after X suspended an account affiliated with a fundraising drive in support of Harris called ‘White Dudes for Kamala.’”
-Max Zahn, ABC News
July 31, 2024
Musk-Backed Super PAC Shakes Up Pro-Trump Field Program
“A new super PAC with ties to Elon Musk is shaking up its field operation, in a major change to what has been envisioned as a significant canvassing program working on behalf of former President Donald J. Trump. The decision is a stark reversal for the group, America PAC, and reveals a rocky start for Mr. Musk and his allies in their first stab at significant political work. The super PAC has one of the most ambitious plans of any outside group seeking to influence the 2024 presidential election. It hopes to spend enormous sums to effectively build a new G.O.P. ground game that could coordinate with the Trump campaign in a novel way.”
-Theodore Schleifer, The New York Times
July 29, 2024
How Elon Musk came to endorse Donald Trump
“In May, Musk helped launch America PAC, which in a little over a month reported raising $8.5 million, much of it from Silicon Valley. Musk has signaled that he will donate, too, but he denied a report in the Wall Street Journal that he would give the group $45 million a month. Musk’s presence at the Palm Beach event marked the culmination of a political transformation for the world’s richest person, who has said he favored Biden in 2020. But in the four years since, Musk’s relationship with the Biden administration steadily soured.”
-Josh Dawsey, Eva Dou and Faiz Siddiqui, The Washington Post
July 23, 2024
“Elon Musk is not spending $45 million a month to elect former President Donald Trump, though he has created a new super political action committee (PAC) to fund the Republican candidate, the billionaire told conservative commentator Jordan Peterson during an interview Monday evening.”
-Eva Roytburg, Fortune
July 20, 2024
“Mr. Musk has transformed himself from an idealistic supporter of Democrats like Barack Obama into a fierce ally of Mr. Trump, whom he flirted with for months and endorsed last weekend roughly 30 minutes after the former president survived an assassination attempt. In fact, Mr. Trump’s campaign at one point had talked with Mr. Musk about him delivering remarks at this week’s Republican National Convention.”
-Theodore Schleifer and Ryan Mac, The New York Times
July 16, 2024
“Musk will donate $45 million per month to the super PAC America PAC, sources familiar with the matter told Bloomberg, The Wall Street Journal and The New York Times, though Federal Election Committee filings do not show Musk has yet contributed to the PAC as of June 30.”
-Brian Bushard, Fortune
Elon Musk Enters Uncharted Territory With Trump Endorsement
“Roughly 30 minutes after former President Donald J. Trump was shot at a rally in Pennsylvania on Saturday, Elon Musk backed his bid for the White House. ‘I fully endorse President Trump and hope for his rapid recovery,’ Mr. Musk wrote on X, the social media platform he owns, sharing a video of Mr. Trump raising his fist. In more than 100 posts after the shooting, Mr. Musk further stepped up his political speech. And on Monday, after Mr. Trump announced that Senator J.D. Vance of Ohio would be his Republican running mate, Mr. Musk posted congratulations and said it was an ‘excellent decision by @realDonaldTrump.’ With those moves, Mr. Musk, 53, entered uncharted territory. He broke with tradition set by the leaders of other major social media firms, none of whom have endorsed a presidential candidate. By using X as a megaphone for his politics — posting to his nearly 190 million followers — Mr. Musk also erased any air of neutrality for the platform.”
-Kate Conger and Ryan Mac
How Elon Musk's empire changes with a second Trump term
“Musk's empire was built with government support — and he has a vested interest in keeping it that way.”
-Nathan Bomey, Axios
July 15, 2024
Elon Musk Allies Help Start Pro-Trump Super PAC - The New York Times
“Some of Elon Musk’s closest friends have helped start a new super PAC meant to help former President Donald J. Trump, creating an avenue for Mr. Musk and his $250 billion fortune to potentially play a significant role in the 2024 presidential race.”
-Theodore Schleifer, The New York Times
July 13, 2024
Elon Musk Endorses Donald Trump Following Assassination Attempt at Campaign Rally
“Following a violent shooting incident during a Trump campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania at which former President Donald Trump was injured and a spectator and the shooter were killed, billionaire Elon Musk offered his full endorsement of former President Trump.”
-Justin Hendrix, Tech Policy Press
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