Elon Musk’s Interest In UK Grooming Gang Scandal Driven By GB News

Elon Musk has been tweeting incessantly for days about a grooming gang scandal that is setting the political weather in Britain, but the origins of how it came onto the radar of the world’s richest man can be traced back a decade.

Charlie Peters, a student about to embark on a philosophy masters at The University of Edinburgh, took the time to leaf through a 159-page report on child exploitation in Rotherham, a town in the north of England. He recalls being astounded by Professor Alexis Jay’s 2014 inquiry, which concluded that at least 1,400 children had been raped, trafficked, and assaulted in the Yorkshire community, predominantly by men of Pakistani heritage.

“I put myself in the shoes of those I was reading about and thought, what would I do in that situation? I realized I wouldn’t be able to do anything. And I felt like that sense of hopelessness was very crushing,” Peters tells Deadline. “There’s never been a bigger national scandal in my lifetime.”

The thunderbolt moment lit a fire in Peters, who channeled his anger over Jay’s findings into a career in journalism. By 2020, he was pursuing new lines of inquiry into grooming gangs, speaking to survivors and local authorities, and tracing the story to different communities across the UK. He called for a national inquiry in a Daily Mail op-ed in 2021 and later shopped a documentary showcasing his findings to some of the biggest media outlets in Britain. Only one bit: GB News.

In February 2023, the Conservative-leaning news channel aired Grooming Gangs: Britain’s Shame and offered Peters a permanent job. Since then, he has continued to pursue the cause and says he has often been the only reporter in local courtrooms when justice is being served to the perpetrators of abuse. 

All the while, Peters’ reporting has been amplified by colleagues who embellish GB News’ output with outraged monologues. Presenters like Patrick Christys have consistently leaned into the racial dimension of the story, accusing the government of failing to act amid fears of offending the “Muslim community.” And it has worked — coverage has resonated. “Every time this story is connected to British-Pakistanis, ratings and traffic go up,” says someone familiar with GB News’ internal audience data.

On the final day of 2024, Musk came across an X/Twitter post from Sam Bidwell, a director of the Adam Smith Institute think-tank and a regular GB News contributor, who listed the 20 British communities that had been “scarred by migrant sex abuse gangs.” The Tesla CEO responded with two exclamation marks, before Bidwell swiftly drew his attention to the reporting of Peters.

Musk would soon have cause to charge further into the issue. On New Year’s Day, Peters’ Christmas holiday was interrupted by a source sending him a letter from Jess Phillips, the UK government’s safeguarding minister, stating that Labour had rejected calls to hold a national inquiry into grooming gangs. Peters scribbled his scoop on X and the update exploded, generating more than 3M views.

Musk has posted about the scandal for nine days straight. In the process, he has called for Phillips to be imprisoned for being a “​​rape genocide apologist.” He has also branded UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer “demented” and “despicable” for defending Phillips — and for his failure to pursue alleged perpetrators in Rochdale during his time as the UK’s most senior prosecutor.

Musk has engaged with or amplified posts from GB News and its presenters on at least 37 occasions during this period, meaning the disruptive network is having an outsized influence on how Donald Trump’s powerful ally is consuming the story. Musk’s contributions have ranged from endorsing GB News commentator Alex Armstrong’s call to ban Starmer from office (which is not possible under the UK’s constitution), to commenting on Peters’ work. “What a travesty,” said Musk, sharing a thread (now viewed 24M times) in which Peters laid out his years of reporting.

Peters says Musk’s entry into the debate has been both a blessing and a curse. He is grateful to the X owner for shining a light on the matter, but worries that it has metastasized into a Westminster bubble story, with commentators “chuckling about the battle between Musk and Starmer.” Peters would prefer the focus to be on the victims of abuse, and to this end, GB News has spotlighted a different survivor story for six days straight.

Peters believes Musk has earnestly held reasons for his interest in grooming gangs and is not simply stoking hatred. The billionaire posted on Tuesday about how his grandmother, Cora Amelia Robinson, hailed from Liverpool and could have been a victim of the abuse. “We’ve looked at grooming gangs in Merseyside, he’s legitimate to care about that,” Peters says. The GB News journalist does not think, however, that Jess Phillips is a “rape genocide apologist.”

Musk’s interest in GB News is another sign that the insurgent network is now firmly established in the UK after launching in 2021. GB News brushed off the threat of an Ofcom fine last year to grow its audience reach in an environment in which its main competitors, BBC News and Sky News, are managing decline. The company lost £42.4M ($53M) in 2023, but its backers, including hedgefund Brexiteer Sir Paul Marshall, appear committed to bankrolling an endeavor that is setting the agenda.

Stewart Purvis, a former ITN and Ofcom executive, has been critical of GB News’ repeated breaches of UK impartiality rules, but he acknowledges the channel’s journalism on grooming gangs. “GB News has always existed for Paul Marshall to have political influence, and now it has proven that he has political influence. If that’s [what he considers to be] a success, then it’s a success,” Purvis adds.

GB News star Patrick Christys has invited Musk on his show to discuss the rape gang story and raise money for survivors. Musk is yet to respond to the invitation, but as Peters says, the tweeter-in-chief’s engagement with the channel’s output is evidence enough that “GB News matters.”