Billionaire and “X” proprietor Elon Musk has mentioned his social media platform should stay “politically impartial” in the way it treats each the left and the correct. However as a personal citizen, Musk has his personal views, and he is sharing them extensively.

Musk is now utilizing his X posts, affect and cash in a push to elect Trump. 

His enthusiastic help for the Republican nominee was maybe no higher illustrated than when Musk, a 53-year-old father of 12, gleefully jumped round on stage behind Trump because the candidate spoke at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, earlier this month. 

“As you possibly can see, I am not simply MAGA, I am darkish MAGA,” Musk joked as he flashed his black “Make America Nice Once more” hat to a cheering crowd. 

Musk, the richest man on this planet with a internet value of $242 billion, in keeping with Forbes, has pledged to offer away $1 million a day to voters for signing his political motion committee’s petition backing the Structure, a pledge consultants say raises authorized questions. 

“Although perhaps a few of the different issues Musk was doing have been of murky legality, this one is clearly unlawful,” wrote Rick Hasen, a UCLA Legislation College political science professor, on the Election Legislation Weblog, in regards to the $1 million per-day giveaway.

He is additionally donating an undisclosed amount of money by means of that political motion committee, America PAC, which he fashioned this summer time to help Trump. Musk has contributed about $75 million to his America PAC since he based it in Could, together with $30 million in September alone, in keeping with Federal Election Fee filings. 

Musk ventures into politics 

Musk hasn’t at all times been so overtly political, though he did categorical help for former President Barack Obama in each 2008 and 2012. He additionally made monetary contributions to Hillary Clinton throughout her 2016 presidential marketing campaign, in keeping with information from Open Secrets and techniques, a nonpartisan analysis group that tracks cash in politics. 

In newer years, Musk’s disdain for Democratic politics has been no secret. 

The Wall Road Journal analyzed Musk’s tweets and located he hardly ever tweeted about President Biden or Trump earlier than buying X, previously Twitter, in October 2022, posting much more about his well-known electrical automobile firm, Tesla. 

However in 2023 and 2024, his posts started to say Trump and Biden much more regularly, to the purpose that he has, in latest months, usually written extra posts mentioning one or the opposite than he has Tesla. In July, the Journal recorded 315 Musk tweets mentioning Trump or Biden, and 129 mentioning Tesla. 

White Home press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre declined to touch upon Musk’s elevated political involvement. 

“I’ve no response, no touch upon that at this second,” Jean-Pierre instructed reporters final Monday. 

X and Tesla didn’t instantly reply to a request for remark. 

How Musk is utilizing Twitter to advertise Trump — and disinformation 

Musk’s public messaging could assist Trump much more than his fortune. 

When Musk took over Twitter, he mentioned he did so as a result of it wasn’t dwelling as much as being a “platform totally free speech.” 

Since then, Musk has fired the groups tasked with combating misleading content material, and within the identify of free speech, he reinstated accounts that have been banned, like that of right-wing conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. 

Not solely is Musk utilizing his platform to push for an “completely decisive victory” for Trump — he is been echoing the disinformation Trump and a few Republicans are selling. 

At a marketing campaign look supporting Trump in Pennsylvania final Thursday, Musk repeated debunked claims elevating doubts in regards to the integrity of Dominion voting machines. Spreading misinformation about Dominion value Fox Information a $787 million settlement in 2023. 

“When you might have mail-in ballots and no proof of citizenship, it is virtually not possible to show dishonest,” Musk instructed the gang. “Statistically there are some very unusual issues that occur which are statistically extremely unlikely. There’s at all times this query of, say, the Dominion voting machines. It’s bizarre that, I believe, they have been utilized in Philadelphia and in Maricopa County [in Arizona] however not in plenty of different locations. Does not that appear like a heck of a coincidence?”

In September, Musk posted an AI-generated, clearly faux picture displaying a lady supposed to be Harris carrying a pink communist uniform, holding a hammer. “Kamala vows to be a communist dictator on day one,” Musk wrote. “Are you able to consider she wears that outfit?” The publish appeared to violate his personal firm’s rule on manipulated content material. 

After the second obvious assassination try on Trump in September, Musk wrote on “X” that “nobody is even making an attempt to assassinate Biden/Kamala,” with a raised eyebrow emoji. He deleted the publish, later insisting his publish was a “joke.” 

Musk additionally got here beneath hearth in November 2023 for calling an antisemitic publish on “X” the “precise reality,” prompting main advertisers equivalent to Coca-Cola and Disney to pull promoting spending from the platform. The unique X publish claimed Jews “have been pushing the precise sort of dialectical hatred towards whites that they declare to need individuals to cease utilizing towards them.”

Musk has change into more and more vocal towards Democratic politicians and their model of governance. He is shunned California’s politics, and been shunned by California as properly.

A California state fee just lately rejected the Area Drive’s efforts to extend SpaceX rocket launches alongside the state’s central coasts, citing environmental considerations. SpaceX has sued California regulators over the choice, claiming it was politically motivated. 

Musk has additionally decried the extent of regulation and taxes in California, and introduced in July that he would transfer each X and SpaceX to Texas in response to a regulation signed by California Gov. Gavin Newsom that bans faculty districts from passing insurance policies that require colleges to inform dad and mom about their kids’s gender id or sexual identification.

However there can also be a extra pragmatic purpose for Musk’s shift to Texas: The Lone Star state has no company revenue tax, whereas California imposes an 8.84% enterprise tax, one of many highest within the nation.

Are Musk’s politics turning away Tesla consumers? 

In the meantime, Musk’s promotion of Trump and his insurance policies could also be turning away some would-be Tesla consumers, consultants say. Within the second quarter, Tesla’s automobile gross sales slumped virtually 5% in contrast with a yr earlier.

“Musk doubling down on the Trump help is clearly not an enormous optimistic relative to Tesla gross sales,” Wedbush analyst Dan Ives instructed CBS Information. “It is on the perimeters, nevertheless it’s undoubtedly had an impression.”

That is as a result of the largest pool of potential electric-vehicle consumers are Democrats, with virtually half saying they’re probably to purchase an EV, Pew Analysis information exhibits. However solely about 1 in 10 Republicans view themselves as more likely to shell out for an EV. 

And Tesla, one of many few EV selections when it began manufacturing in 2008, now has loads of competitors from main automakers equivalent to Ford, Chevrolet and Volkswagen. That is giving people who find themselves uncomfortable with Musk’s politics however who need a inexperienced automobile the choice to buy elsewhere.

Musk could have been pushed towards Trump partly due to the Biden administration’s snub of Tesla autos when it first rolled out its EV tax incentives. Its fashionable Mannequin Y certified for the $7,500 tax credit score final yr after the IRS broadened its automobile classifications.

“The Biden administration mainly has considered Musk as not related — he is been overlooked of the dialog,” Ives added. 

In 2023, Musk lower a cope with the White Home to open Tesla automobile prices to different automakers, in trade for with the ability to entry federal funds. Tesla gained $17 million in EV charging grants from the bipartisan infrastructure regulation Mr. Biden regularly touts. However earlier this yr, Musk fired his Supercharger workforce, upending and undermining the corporate’s charging technique.

How Musk would profit from a Trump presidency

Tesla buyers are involved about Musk’s political involvement as a result of they’d prefer to see him extra targeted on his companies, Ives mentioned. Trump instructed the Financial Membership of New York in a latest speech that he plans to nominate Musk to guide a brand new authorities effectivity fee that may audit the “whole” federal authorities. Ives has doubts about how possible this could be.”Until he recreates an AI model of himself, I do not see the way it’s finished,” Ives mentioned of Musk’s capability to take a authorities job on high of his management of Tesla, SpaceX and X, in addition to roles in different companies equivalent to Neuralink and The Boring Firm. 

Ives was additionally suggesting that putting Musk in a authorities position may pose severe conflicts of curiosity, given Musk’s huge enterprise empire.

Trump, who lower the company tax fee to 21% from the prior 35% by means of his 2017 Tax Cuts & Jobs Act, is now vowing to scale back the speed to fifteen% — doubtlessly benefiting Musk’s enterprise empire. Altering the tax code would require congressional approval, nevertheless. 

Trump and Musk are each combating towards transgender points 

Trump has taken on transgender points as a central theme of his marketing campaign, vowing to withhold federal funding from colleges that train transgender issues, and insisting on retaining the genders assigned at start separate in sports activities. 

Musk has been vocal about his emotions on transgender issues, too. Reuters reported in 2022 that Musk has donated tens of millions of {dollars} towards a gaggle that runs ant-trans advertisements. 

Musk has come beneath hearth for calling his youngster who’s transgender “lifeless.” Wilson transitioned a number of years in the past, at 16, and has spoken out on social media condemning her father’s feedback and habits. Musk instructed far-right on-line determine Jordan Peterson that Wilson’s transition made him oppose gender-affirming remedies. 

Alain Sherter

contributed to this report.