This combination of photos shows former President Donald Trump at a rally in Minden, Nev., on Oct. 8, 2022, left, and Elon Musk in Wilmington, Del., on July 12, 2021.
Matt Rourke/AP
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Matt Rourke/AP
Former President Donald Trump and billionaire X owner Elon Musk said a lot but made little new in a meandering interview marred by a lengthy technical delay Monday night.
For the most part, Trump’s comments followed the contours of one of his rally speeches: He castigated undocumented immigrants as dangerous, bragged about his relationships with leaders of U.S. adversaries like Kim Jong Un and Vladimir Putin, and insulted his political opponents, particularly President Biden and Vice President Harris.
Musk intervened largely to signal his agreement with Trump and added his own insights, including digressions on the root causes of inflation and concerns about air quality. It made for a contradictory display of camaraderie: the men repeatedly agreed with each other while speaking without understanding each other.
The conversation didn’t get off to a very smooth start. As people tried to connect, many were greeted with a message on X saying that the Spaces audio feed was unavailable. The conversation eventually started about 40 minutes later than expected. Musk blamed a cyberattack, but he provided no evidence to back up the claim, and the rest of the website appeared to be functioning normally.
The setbacks are reminiscent of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ botched campaign on X, then known as Twitter, last year, which was plagued by technical problems and abruptly shut down after 20 minutes. But Monday’s interview eventually aired and had 1.3 million listeners at its peak, according to X’s statistics.
Elon Musk, who has supported Donald Trump, began the interview by saying his questions would not pressure the former president. “Nobody is really themselves in an adversarial interview,” Musk said. “It’s hard to get a sense of someone’s attitude if you don’t hear them speaking in a normal way.”
They spent the first 20 minutes discussing the assassination attempt on Trump at a July rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, where Musk’s support for Trump was on full display.
Elon Musk praised Trump for standing up and raising his fist after being targeted by gunfire. “I think a lot of people admire your courage under fire,” he added.
After that, the two men moved on to topics on which they agree, including illegal immigration and what they see as the Biden administration’s failure to secure the U.S.-Mexico border.
Trump Returns to X as Musk Embraces Right-Wing Politics
Monday’s interview marked Trump’s first major reappearance on X since Musk reinstated his account following his purchase of the platform in late 2022.
Twitter banned the former president after his supporters rioted at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, saying Trump’s posts violated its rules against promoting violence. Since then, Trump has spent most of his time online posting on his own social network, Truth Social.
The former president has stepped up online outreach as he tries to regain attention after Democrats’ decision to swap Harris for Biden as their nominee.
The conversation with Trump is the most visible example yet of Musk’s increasingly open embrace of right-wing politics. He supported Trump in July after the assassination attempt on the former president, but has said he previously considered himself a “moderate Democrat.”
Elon Musk’s inner circle has formed a super PAC that supports Trump and is expected to pour millions of dollars into Trump’s reelection campaign. No donations from Musk to the group have been disclosed to the Federal Election Commission so far, but those close to the billionaire say he is expected to financially support the effort, and Trump touted Musk’s financial support during the campaign. Meanwhile, the group’s data-gathering practices in key swing states are under investigation by state prosecutors.
Musk’s control of X has created a situation in which the go-to online platform for real-time news and information has also become the platform for a major political candidate in a presidential election.
“We don’t have a precedent of a social media platform owner aggressively defending a candidate, particularly when that person is themselves widely spreading disinformation and extremism,” said Brendan Nyhan, a political science professor at Dartmouth College.
Elon Musk has upended Twitter’s previous political neutrality
Before Elon Musk took over the platform, Twitter, now X, had tried to remain politically neutral since its founding in 2006. And despite the shortcomings of those efforts, the platform’s leaders have taken pains to avoid being swayed by ideological views. Not without controversy, of course: suspended accounts and flagged posts have sparked accusations of political bias, particularly from right-wing voices.
But now, Musk has completely rethought the platform’s norms. Feeds on X are regularly flooded with posts from virulent Trump spokespeople who demonize Democrats and celebrate the former president, even for users who don’t follow those accounts.
Musk frequently uses his outsized presence on X to promote his political views, often sharing memes, jokes, or other posts from right-wing commentators on culture war issues. He criticizes transgender rights, posts misleading claims about immigration, and shares eye-popping assessments of crime in major American cities, among his frequent topics — topics he shares with Trump.
He also sparked debate among disinformation researchers when he posted a deepfake video of Harris that he defended as a parody, even though it was not marked as such.
Elon Musk recently commented on the anti-immigrant riots in the United Kingdom, writing that “civil war is inevitable.” His comments drew rebuke from British government officials, who fear his posts could further inflame the violence that has erupted in the country.
This type of polarizing behavior puts Musk’s political activity at apparent odds with his business goals, said Sarah T. Roberts, director of UCLA’s Center for Critical Internet Inquiry, who spent time as a researcher at Twitter in 2022 before Musk bought the company.
“Their business is designed to attract particular demographics and people who share their views. They can do that, but they certainly alienate other people,” Roberts said. “So it’s a big gamble for someone who’s trying to create a product that’s popular.”
