After a tumultuous year of allyship with Donald Trump that has seen Tesla stock crash and public sentiment turn against him, Elon Musk reflected on his time on the sidelines of power in a sit-down interview with Fox News host/first daughter-in-law/wannabe pop star Lara Trump. Musk even revealed where it all went wrong.
“I’d seen videos of people streaming across the border on Twitter, now X, and I’m like, ‘Are these? Is this real?’” Musk said, referring to the decontextualized and unverifiable click-bait that dominates the social media platform he now owns.
“So I said, I’m going to the border myself. So I went to Eagle Pass, Texas and, sure enough, people streaming across the border,” Musk claimed.
The Biden administration is actively aiding and abetting illegal immigration, because they are viewed as future voters
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 8, 2024
The clips prompted the world’s richest man to embark on his takeover of Twitter, he said, arguing that the purchase was motivated by a desire to strip the platform of “censorship” and “let the marketplace of ideas win.”
“When I felt the walls of censorship closing in, I was like, ‘OK, I gotta do something.’ And the thing I can do is acquire Twitter and make it a bastion of free speech,” Musk continued.
Contrary to Musk’s assessment, Twitter’s own analysis of its algorithm found in 2021 that right-wing politicians and media perspectives were being amplified over left-wing ones. Since Musk bought the company for $44 billion in 2022, that right-wing bias has only grown, with formerly suspended accounts reinstated and a litany of anti-“woke” conspiracy theories allowed to flourish. Millions have departed the platform since Musk’s takeover and its market value has declined by 80 percent.
Musk’s biographer, Walter Isaacson, has previously made the argument that the eternally online Musk was radicalized by Twitter. His shift from Obama-donating moderate to seig-heiling DOGE director over the course of three years can be attributed to the transition of his daughter Vivian who tweeted, in 2022, “I no longer live with or wish to be related to my biological father in any way, shape or form.”
“My son, Xavier, died,” Musk tweeted earlier this year. “He was killed by the woke mind virus. Now, the woke mind virus will die”.
While Musk’s radicalization may have more than one root, the influence of the social media platform—which has been found to be the biggest spreader of disinformation online—appears to be where it all began.
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