close
close

Apre-salomemanzo

Breaking: Beyond Headlines!

Elon Musk gets one last face before voters go to the polls
aecifo

Elon Musk gets one last face before voters go to the polls

Fresh out of his victory in court yesterdaytech billionaire turned political operative Elon Musk logged onto X and posted a QAnon video.

The sixty-second the video has a fashionable aestheticA art style popular with the online far-right that mixes fascist memes with a retro scanline-infused style. In the video, clips of Donald Trump from the 1980s and today mix with military footage and scenes of docile American suburban life.

After 36 seconds, the word “Patriots” appears on the screen, becomes confused and becomes “PATRIQTS”. The other letters disappear, leaving only Q. “We’ll kick out the globalists…we’ll kick out the communists,” Trump says in the blurry footage as Van Halen’s Jump plays. This is an obvious reference to QAnon conspiracy. A popular part of the conspiracy theory is that Trump will one day utter a magic code word that will activate sleeper cells loyal to Trump across the country who will arrest and execute his political enemies.

Musk obtained the video from the West Bestern account, a Blue Check X user who has spent the past few weeks searching for Trump online and posting similar content. The account’s banner references both an anti-trans and anti-Semitic conspiracy theory. In January, the account shared a racist meme about Amazon delivery drivers and called the company AmaZog, another reference to a anti-Semitic conspiracy theory.

These are the kind of people Musk is promoting on his platform on the final day of the election.

Musk’s X-feed has been full of pro-Trump posts and rocket photos for days. Since the billionaire joined Trump this summer, he has spent a lot of time and money promoting his preferred candidate on the website he owns. According to a study by the Center for Countering Digital Hate, Musk’s posts generated approximately 17 billion views since July. The study says this is equivalent to spending $24 million on advertising campaigns. Musk paid $44 billion to buy Twitter.

The quality of these opinions remains to be seen. Not every eye is an endorsement, and for many of us who still use X, we feel like we’re trapped on the site with Musk. Anyone who scrolls down to the For You tab will be forced by an algorithm to see some stupid shit Musk has posted.

Currently, Musk’s feed largely consists of clips from his recent appearance with Joe Rogan. Last night, the popular podcast released a freshly recorded episode with Musk and officially endorsed Trump for president. Rogan posting Musk’s video and giving his support on this date close to November 5th is a bit strange. More than 78 million Americans have already voted, and while early voting is down overall, it is up sharply in key states like North Carolina and Georgia. Tens of millions of people have already made up their minds and are completely inaccessible for a last minute move like this.

Among the clips Musk selected were videos of him speaking. P’Nut the squirrelrants about immigrants and voter ID laws, and the assertion that if Kamala Harris won, it would be the last election America ever held. Another popular obsession in these clips was misinformation, the lies of the mainstream media, and the power of X as a bastion of truth. That’s pretty rich coming from a guy who reposted a video of an anonymous blue check spreading bullshit about an occupied Zionist government.

As election eve wore on, Musk was supposed to appear in a live town hall hosted on X as a final rally for Trump. It didn’t go well. Scheduled to start at 8 p.m. EST, the event started 20 minutes late. The moderator attempted to answer questions from the audience, but they could not be heard. “Well, I think if people vote, we’re definitely going to win,” Musk said on the call.

Then he canceled everything. “Let’s cancel this, as we seem to be having technical problems.” Then he posted all night.