By Dave Lee / Bloomberg Opinion
Elon Musk’s America PAC — which he has funded with $75 million from his own pocket — launched last week what it’s calling the Election Integrity Community on X, formerly Twitter. The group purports to be “dedicated to sharing potential instances of voter fraud and irregularities” as voters head to the polls.
You can probably already guess how it’s going. Within 24 hours, conspiracy theories have filled the stream. Some are a lazy rehashing of 2020’s thoroughly debunked “scandals,” such as voting machines “switching” votes from Republican to Democrat. Others are newer twists featuring familiar characters, like Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger who was on the receiving end of Trump’s “Fellas, I just need 11,000 votes” call the last time around. As I write this, the top post in the Election Integrity Community accuses Raffensperger of working to set up a shadowy fund to “force” the election result (he isn’t).
Before Musk took over, this was the kind of toxic and dangerous misinformation Twitter used to try to curtail. The company’s trust and safety team knew it takes just minutes for a rumor to take hold and seed distrust or provoke real-world violence.
Today, Musk and, more recently, his America PAC encourage and amplify this kind of content. The Election Integrity Community is a backup plan in case Musk’s personal efforts to get out the Trump vote in swing states fall short. Like the former president, who has yet to acknowledge he lost in 2020, Musk is laying the groundwork for “Stop the Steal 2024.”
The reason is clear. A Trump White House would be extremely good for Musk and his business interests. A New York Times report over the weekend counted no fewer than 11 government departments and agencies investigating Musk’s companies. Those probes might lose their teeth or go away entirely under Trump; particularly if the former president feels he owes Musk a favor.
Trump’s indebtedness might lead to Musk gaining unprecedented power as the head of a new “Department of Government Efficiency” that would have the power to audit spending at those same agencies trying to hold Musk to account or merely slow him down. He wants free rein, and often government contracts and subsidies, to launch rockets to Mars with SpaceX, plant chips in people’s brains with Neuralink, roll out rural broadband with Starlink, and put robotaxis on the road with Tesla.
Before pulling the “rigged” ripcord, Musk is trying to help Trump legitimately; but there’s a problem. “We have an issue of apathy,” Musk told a crowd recently. “Some people think their vote doesn’t count.” (Can’t think why.)
His solution is to give away $1 million every day until the election — supposedly at random — to a signatory of the America PAC’s “petition” in support of the constitution (at least the free speech and the right to bear arms parts). Exactly who Musk is petitioning is unclear. The Constitution, after all, already exists, and nobody of any consequence is trying to get rid of it.
It’s the other eligibility requirement, then, that truly matters. To qualify for Musk’s prize, a person must be registered to vote in one of several swing states. This stipulation means Musk’s efforts are “clearly illegal,” wrote Rick Hasen, an expert in electoral law at UCLA. There are calls for the Justice Department to investigate, but it likely won’t matter; Hasen and others find it unlikely any action would be taken before the election. Musk is already taking credit for what he claims has been surge in Republican voter registrations in Pennsylvania, where the vote could go down to the wire. (Biden won the state by 80,555 votes in 2020.)
Registration doesn’t necessarily mean a vote for Trump, though. Not leaving anything to chance, Musk is ready to question the election results should his preferred candidate not win. During his “speaking tour,” which began last week, Musk has taken to giving more than a nudge and a wink toward the theories he knows are catnip to Trump and his supporters; such as the use of Dominion voting machines or the security of mail-in ballots.
The Election Integrity Community is a tool to give birth to new ones. The group will come to life as Americans start going to the polls en masse. It will serve as another engine room to rumors that will quickly break free from X and land in the group chats and Nextdoor forums of regular people, spread under the blanket of “just asking questions” or “sharing for visibility.”
The results could be chaotic and dangerous. The pockets of disorder at polling stations and counting locations in 2020 could become much more widespread, endangering election workers or simply just scaring voters from heading to the polls at all. Local officials might find themselves under pressure to shut down the vote for safety reasons or, in the fog of misinformation, to “get to the bottom” of rumors.
All this will be orchestrated or amplified by Musk. Already this year, FEMA aid workers have been threatened off the back of disinformation, some of which came from Musk. “FEMA used up its budget ferrying illegals into the country instead of saving American lives,” Musk posted on X. “Treason.”
Over the weekend, Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson was compelled to refute Musk’s incorrect posts claiming the state had “far more people registered to vote than there [are] eligible voters” and that it meant the process was corrupted.
“It’s sad, it’s really disappointing,” Benson told MSNBC of Musk’s attacks. He won’t care. Today, disseminating anger and fear has become X’s primary purpose. With advertising revenue dropping precipitously, perhaps the only value X still has left, for Musk at least, is that it can help him put Trump back into the White House.
Dave Lee is Bloomberg Opinion’s US technology columnist. He was previously a correspondent for the Financial Times and BBC News. More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com/opinion ©2024 Bloomberg L.P.
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