Elon Musk’s $44 Billion Free-Speech Crusade

A name change might be one of the smaller changes X users have noticed about Twitter since the platform was purchased by Elon Musk in April 2022. Reports have shown a consistent increase in the volume of misinformation and hate speech on the platform since Musk’s acquisition. Musk considers himself to be a champion of the First Amendment, claiming to be a “free-speech absolutist,” a position he has used to justify the sweeping changes made to X under his leadership. While many applaud Musk for what he claims is protecting free-speech and removing the platform’s left-leaning bias for content moderation, there is a growing concern amongst leaders that the rise of misinformation on the platform threatens to undermine democracies across the world.

X’s role in global political discourse was a primary reason that the tech billionaire purchased Twitter for $44 billion. At the time, Musk recognized that “Twitter is the digital town square where matters vital to the future of humanity are debated,” and vowed to remove the free-speech restrictions he saw on the platform. Despite this promise, changes to the content moderation policy were not part of Musk’s reformation of the platform. What his changes did include was the firing of over 80% of the company’s employees, including the vast majority of the staff in charge of content moderation, and the reinstatement of controversial banned users. Figures like Alex Jones and former President Trump returned to the platform, despite previously being permanently banned for tweeting misinformation that many claimed incited violence. With a new owner who is publicly against moderation, no staff to moderate content, and an influx of newly reinstated and empowered controversial users, X began operating under a new rulebook. 

Without the moderation team in place to keep the site’s content within its policy guidelines, the algorithm, which already prioritized engagement over promoting a user’s desired content, filled timelines with hate speech, conspiracies, and misinformation. Content designed to mislead users or to hold their attention by enraging them has flourished. An analysis by the Harvard Kennedy School found that “contentious actors” saw significant increases in engagement compared to other users after the acquisition, encouraged to produce controversial content by X’s new monetization policies. Musk, the most followed user on X, has participated in the spreading of political misinformation and conspiracies to his 197 million followers, much of which has centered around the 2024 election. In early September, Musk retweeted to his followers a false claim that 2 million non-citizens had registered to vote in key battleground states, fueling the growing distrust in the American electoral processes.

The effects of these changes have not been limited to user experience. Misinformation that gains traction on X has routinely impacted real-world politics. The power of X’s content was on full display during the first debate between former President Trump and Vice President Harris, where Trump repeated a proven lie spread on X about Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio. Since Trump’s declaration that Haitian immigrants are “eating the dogs,” the lie has grown in popularity on the platform, with politicians like Senator Ted Cruz tweeting A.I. generated images of Trump saving dogs accompanied by captions that read: “Please vote for Trump so Haitian immigrants don’t eat us.” Global political organizations have taken notice of the unique threat that X poses to the political landscape; the EU has since labeled X as the biggest source of fake news and misinformation out of the major social media platforms. The EU’s report claims that X has the largest ratio of misinformation to non-misinformation posts and that the platform turns a blind eye to its content. X is developing a multinational track record of promoting misinformation that alters public trust in elections, causing leaders to seek ways to moderate a privately owned business without violating its users’ free speech.

Meanwhile, following Brazil’s contentious 2022 election, where supporters of former President Bolsonaro stormed government buildings claiming the election was stolen, Brazilian government officials made the decision to combat misinformation on social media, bringing the country into a direct conflict with X and Musk. The Brazilian Supreme Court controversially gave Justice Alexandre de Moraes the power to order social media platforms to take down content he views as undermining their democracy. As part of his campaign, Justice Moraes claimed that election misinformation and conspiracies spread on X were partly responsible for the riots that followed their last election and that X did not do enough to stop their spread. He ordered that X take down accounts responsible for spreading election conspiracies, pay fines for their complacency, and establish legal representation in the country. X ignored the orders from Justice Moraes, leading him to ban the platform in the country in August, igniting a war between Moraes and Musk and a debate over governmental powers to combat misinformation.

Justice Moraes’ drastic measure against X drew heavy criticism, with many labeling it an overreach of judicial powers and a threat to Brazilian democracy. Musk emerged as the leading voice against Justice Moraes, labeling him a “dictator” and “Alexandre de Voldemort.” Musk’s voice on the issue proved its weight, as his vocal denouncement of Justice Moraes and the ruling brought international news coverage to the issue and became integral to Brazil’s Congress killing of a bill that aimed to further combat misinformation. Musk publicly stood strong against the Brazilian government, and the site remained down for three weeks in September, but financial pressures began to weigh on the company. X has already proven to be a financial struggle for Musk, and despite his promise to quickly turn the historically-unprofitable company profitable, its valuation from X’s $44 billion purchase price has plummeted under its new ownership. With the company already bleeding money, losing its third-biggest user market of over 20 million users was a catastrophic loss. This, combined with Justice Moraes freezing Starlink’s finances in Brazil to try to collect $3 million in fines, put Musk’s financial interests in direct competition with his political beliefs. 

Despite his firm public resolution, it appears that business interests rank higher on Musk’s list of priorities than personal beliefs. On September 20, X announced that it is taking action to comply with Justice Moraes’ demands, including removing the users accused of spreading misinformation. While this is a victory in Brazil’s campaign against misinformation, many argue that it sets a dangerous precedent for the government’s ability to moderate speech on a public platform. Brazil may be the first in a series of future battles between X and legislation aimed at curtailing the spread of misinformation. A few days before X’s announcement that it would comply with Brazil’s demands, the legislature in Australia proposed a bill that would fine social media companies 5% of their global revenue if they did not create and follow approved codes of conduct to moderate misinformation. Musk quickly fired back against the bill, calling the legislatures “fascists.” Australian Minister Bill Shorten replied, “When it’s a commercial interest, [Musk]is the champion of free speech and when he doesn’t like it…he’s going to shut it all down.”

This type of legislation could massively impact how politics is discussed on X and other social media platforms. If more countries are willing to go as far as Brazil, social media executives will be forced to reevaluate their methods to drive engagement on their platforms. Whether the efforts to stop misinformation will be successful, and what impact they will have on free speech, is yet to fully be seen, but it is clear that even the most unyielding of social media executives may fall prey to financial pressures to comply.