Elon Musk takes @America handle from X user to promote Donald Trump
Elon Musk takes @America handle from X user to promote Donald Trump
The original @America user was a critic of both Musk and Trump.
X owner Elon Musk has once again hijacked a rare coveted username from its original user.
This time, however, the takeover wasn’t for the good of X the company, it was so Musk could promote Donald Trump for president.
On Saturday, Musk appeared at Donald Trump’s rally in Butler Pennsylvania. However, earlier that day, Musk began promoting his pro-Trump Super PAC, called America PAC, using a brand new handle @America.
“Read @America to understand why I’m supporting Trump for President,” Musk’s new bio said as of approximately 1:30pm ET on Saturday, Oct. 5.
The @America handle appeared attached to a brand new account setup just this month, in October 2024. However, this rare, one-word geographic handle had already been long registered by another X user more than 14 years prior to Musk taking the handle from them, in September 2010.
According to a person familiar with the situation, X took the handle from the user much like how Musk’s social media company took the @X handle from its original registrant last year.
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Honest question from a non-American.
If Trump loses, how much of a case does Harris have of going after Musk for interfering in an election?
Probably very little.
I'm not up to speed on what Twitter is doing these days outside of what's reported here on lemmy.
Unless Musk starts saying things like "Polls are closing early so don't bother voting because Trump won" or things that will suppress votes, his actions and tweets are going to be categorized as political free speech, which has broad interpretation in the US. Sad, but true.
We, as well as our government officials, should remember that Twitter is not the public town square. It's a dumpster fire that is owned by a private entity that permits users to throw their shit into. That private entity is within their right to do whatever they want within the confines of the law.
You mean like his mother telling people to go vote 10 times with 10 fake names?
It is unbelievable to me how everyone is just walzing past the fact that a super-pac organizer attended a rally with the candidate.
My knowledge on this topic is very minimal, but is it because the SuperPAC isn't supposed to be coordinating with either party?
52 USC 30118: Contributions or expenditures by national banks, corporations, or labor organizations
Text contains those laws in effect on October 6, 2024It is unlawful for any national bank, or any corporation organized by authority of any law of Congress, to make a contribution or expenditure in connection with any election to any political office, or in connection with any primary election or political convention or caucus held to select candidates for any political office, or for any corporation whatever, or any labor organization, to make a contribution or expenditure in connection with any election at which presidential and vice presidential electors or a Senator or Representative in, or a Delegate or Resident Commissioner to, Congress are to be voted for, or in connection with any primary election or political convention or caucus held to select candidates for any of the foregoing offices, or for any candidate, political committee, or other person knowingly to accept or receive any contribution prohibited by this section, or any officer or any director of any corporation or any national bank or any officer of any labor organization to consent to any contribution or expenditure by the corporation, national bank, or labor organization, as the case may be, prohibited by this section.
It's one of the few threads of campaign finance law that still exist. Things to keep in mind, in-kind contributions are still contributions. An example would be, directing your private business that is in no way affiliated with your super PAC to promote and fundraise for the candidate that you are standing on stage at a rally with. If that isn't "in connection with" then I don't know what is.
If you make the connection that Elon being there is also "in connection with" then wouldn't that now spill over with Elon acting as the head of twitter, confiscating the @America handle to give to the SuperPAC to promote Trump? One links the other?
In which case Twitter is now providing an in kind contribution?
Assuming that is a problem, then the only way it wouldn't be is if the SuperPAC itself paid the original holder of @America to sell it to them and then Twitter did the hand over at both parties request?
This is of course subject to whatever SCOTUS sock puppet Alito has his ghostly hand up the ass of, but the way it was intended to work was that super pacs can receive and spend limitlessly so long as there is no coordination with the candidate. Elon can't call trump and ask what trump would like the pac to do. So Elon being a right wing shit head is legal all day, so long as he doesn't do any of his right wing shit headery in connection with trump.
And yes, that would usually imply that if there is coordination then all contributions, even those in kind, are campaign contributions and must be regulated and disclosed. Which they aren't. And probably won't be. But if this case comes up in a few years, the right wing shit head chorus will cry alligator tears about the poor oppressed witch-hunted trump. FML.
I'm more worried about election officials getting star treatment at a candidate's rallies.
None.
Private citizens and companies can endorse whoever they want.
I don't think she'll have to. MAGA will implode along with Truth Social, Twitter, and maybe even Tesla as I'm sure Elon has turned off many potential buyers just as competing car companies are getting closer in value as Tesla.
None, because there isn't even a pretension of justice under fascism.
how is this election interference, it isn't forcing anyone to vote a particular way, nor is it manipulating ballots?
Look who really owns Twitter. It's the people who loaned Musk money for his buyout.
Who is top of that list? Saudi Arabia.
And now Twitter is fully in service to the Republican party? Sounds like foreign electoral intervention to me...
why shouldn't Saudi Arabia be able to endorse and support a US political candidate?