The comment capped a chaotic weekend by which Musk abruptly modified course on a number of main points for the corporate, which he acquired for $44 billion a little bit over every week in the past. After shedding about half of the workforce on Friday, Twitter started scrambling to rehire some who have been let go. It postponed the deliberate launch of its new paid verification product till after the midterm elections.
And it suspended common accounts for impersonating Musk, underneath a brand new coverage that the corporate’s new CEO introduced Sunday.
To independent-minded voters:
Shared energy curbs the worst excesses of each events, due to this fact I like to recommend voting for a Republican Congress, on condition that the Presidency is Democratic.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 7, 2022
Musk’s endorsement of GOP candidates to his 115 million Twitter followers, a day earlier than midterm elections, is more likely to intensify the partisan divide over his takeover of the platform. Lawmakers prior to now have grilled executives of social media firms together with Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and YouTube as as to whether their choices might have influenced election outcomes, at the same time as these executives have studiously averted signaling their preferences for a given social gathering or candidate.
Musk has proven himself to be an outspoken and sometimes erratic CEO, susceptible to outbursts — generally in public boards equivalent to earnings calls. Meanwhile his public pronouncements on Tesla have at instances damaged well-understood norms, such because the expectation that firm leaders withhold touch upon market-moving issues through the buying and selling day.
“Tesla stock price is too high imo,” he declared in a single tweet — sending the inventory plunging. Musk tweeted in 2018 that he had “Funding secured” to take Tesla personal for $420 per share, main the Securities and Exchange Commission to accuse him of deceptive traders. Musk and Tesla every agreed to pay $20 million fines within the ordeal, and Musk relinquished his board chairmanship of Tesla within the settlement.
But Musk’s shoot-from-the-hip ethos carries new gravity as he runs Twitter, a extremely influential discussion board the place thousands and thousands search out information, election data and communications from world leaders. As Musk’s curiosity in proudly owning Twitter was changing into obvious, he mentioned Twitter serves as a “de facto public town square,” and may adhere to ideas of free speech, doing little past what the legislation explicitly requires to police itself.
His endorsement within the elections because the CEO of a massively influential social media website shines a brand new gentle on how he plans to execute that imaginative and prescient.
Musk’s endorsement of Republicans could come as a shock to some, however he has been expressing disdain for the route of the Democratic Party in recent times. In April, he wrote that he strongly supported Obama for president, however that the social gathering had been “hijacked by extremists.”
“I support free speech, but not any one candidate. In fact, I gave money to & voted for Hillary & then voted for Biden,” he tweeted in May. “However, given unprovoked attacks by leading Democrats against me & a very cold shoulder to Tesla & SpaceX, I intend to vote Republican.”
Musk gave further perception into his politics on Monday, tweeting “To be clear, my historical party affiliation has been Independent, with an actual voting history of entirely Democrat until this year.” He added he’d be open to voting Democrat sooner or later.
To be clear, my historic social gathering affiliation has been Independent, with an precise voting historical past of completely Democrat till this 12 months
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 7, 2022
Musk had expressed frustration with California’s authorities amid shelter-in-place orders throughout coronavirus restrictions in 2020, as Tesla’s manufacturing facility there was closed. In May of that 12 months, he defiantly reopened Tesla’s plant — accepting the help of President Donald Trump in his push to interrupt with county-level stay-at-home orders. Musk broke right into a profanity-laced rant throughout a Tesla earnings name across the time, calling quarantine measures “fascist.”
Musk’s sudden, dramatic strikes energized some on the proper, who view Musk as reversing Twitter’s leftward shift underneath earlier management. And it saved many customers glued to Twitter, the place his follower rely continued to develop quickly over the weekend.
Musk mentioned Friday that Twitter has seen a “massive drop in revenue, due to activist groups pressuring advertisers” to cease promoting on the platform.
Researchers noticed early indicators that the dialog on the platform was already altering within the first week of Musk’s possession, as conspiracy theorists appeared emboldened by his guarantees of a hands-off method to policing the platform.
In Musk’s first 5 days of possession of Twitter, posts from accounts associated to the baseless pro-Trump extremist group QAnon practically doubled in line with the nonprofit Advance Democracy, which conducts public curiosity analysis. And tweets casting doubt on U.S. elections have been receiving hundreds of retweets and no labels, the analysis discovered.
Musk sought to quell the issues of advertisers, however the subject ballooned as he selected to conduct large-scale layoffs within the run-up to the midterm elections, prompting fears about how the platform could be policed. It hadn’t helped that Musk himself, days after taking possession of the positioning, shared a submit containing misinformation in regards to the assault on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Paul Pelosi. Musk tweeted, then deleted, a submit linking to a conspiracy theory-laden article from the Santa Monica Observer, described by fact-checkers as a low-credibility supply favoring the acute proper.
Some advertisers selected to precise warning as Twitter entered the period of Musk’s possession.
Companies together with General Motors, Volkswagen Group and General Mills all mentioned they have been pausing promoting on Twitter. Meanwhile civil rights teams known as for an advertiser boycott, with NAACP President Derrick Johnson saying, “It is immoral, dangerous, and highly destructive to our democracy for any advertiser to fund a platform that fuels hate speech, election denialism, and conspiracy theories.”
Under monetary stress to show the corporate round shortly, Musk has been touting a plan to cost customers $8 per thirty days to get verified and obtain a verify mark testifying to their account’s authenticity, amongst different advantages. Musk initially promised the brand new subscription plan, generally known as Twitter Blue, would launch on Monday, and there was widespread confusion Saturday about whether or not the function was launching.
But an individual conversant in the plans, who spoke on the situation of anonymity to debate inside plans, advised The Washington Post the launch won’t occur till after the midterms. The New York Times first reported the delay.
The firm started reaching out over the weekend to attempt to rehire staff it had simply laid off, in line with a number of inside sources, together with two with direct data of the rehiring efforts who spoke on the situation of anonymity to debate delicate issues. Among the folks Twitter is alleged to be looking for to rehire are engineers who labored on the corporate’s Android app, members of its Cortex machine-learning staff, and others with particular technical experience wanted to launch new merchandise, sources advised The Post. The try and carry again laid-off staff was first reported by Platformer on Friday.
“They’re asking people to come back because a lot of things are breaking there,” mentioned one laid-off Twitter worker who was requested about their curiosity in returning to the corporate. A number of groups “were completely eliminated without much thought and now it’s causing roadblocks for other teams. It’s been a frustrating week for those employed, too.”
The worker, who spoke on the situation of anonymity to debate personnel issues, advised The Post they deliberate to say no the supply to return.
Generating a number of the most controversy, Twitter began suspending accounts “engaged in impersonation” on Sunday after Musk introduced that each one accounts falsely utilizing the names of actual folks with no “parody” label could be instantly banned from the platform.
The transfer got here after a flood of customers modified their show names to match Musk’s — lots of whom jeered his controversial announcement that Twitter would quickly cost customers $8 per thirty days for verification.
“Going forward, any Twitter handles engaging in impersonation without clearly specifying ‘parody’ will be permanently suspended,” Musk tweeted Sunday afternoon. “Previously, we issued a warning before suspension, but now that we are rolling out widespread verification, there will be no warning.”
The new impersonation coverage appeared to contradict Musk’s assurance final week that he would convene a “content moderation council with widely diverse viewpoints” earlier than making any main choices. In May, Musk criticized everlasting suspensions, saying that they “fundamentally undermine trust in Twitter.”
Musk had additionally beforehand indicated he would reinstate completely suspended accounts equivalent to that of Trump, who was banned after the Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol underneath Twitter’s insurance policies towards inciting violence. But final week he mentioned the corporate wouldn’t carry again Trump or different banned accounts earlier than the midterms.
Among these suspended from Twitter for altering their show names to “Elon Musk” was comic Kathy Griffin, who, underneath Musk’s moniker, urged Americans to vote for Democrats within the midterm elections.
“I’ve decided that voting blue for their choice is only right,” she wrote shortly earlier than her account was suspended. YouTuber Ethan Klein was additionally seemed to be suspended from the platform after he joined these impersonating Musk.
Griffin’s followers known as Twitter’s transfer a crackdown on freedom of speech and parody, utilizing the hashtag #freekathy to criticize the platform’s new coverage. Later on Sunday, Musk, who’s the world’s richest individual, tweeted that Griffin might have her account again if she paid up.
“If she really wants her account back, she can have it,” Musk wrote. “For $8.”
Verification! Impersonation! Twitter Blue! There’s quite a bit happening round identification on Twitter — let’s break down what our insurance policies are, and a number of the massive questions we nonetheless have to reply…
— Yoel Roth (@yoyoel) November 8, 2022
Late Monday, Twitter’s head of security and integrity, Yoel Roth, expanded on the brand new emphasis on impersonation in a tweet thread, arguing that the positioning’s enlargement of verification — denoted by a blue verify mark — raises the stakes.
“When Verified accounts use impersonation as a tactic — whether for parody or not — it creates an especially confusing experience,” he wrote, including such accounts could be suspended when Twitter found them. “We’re particularly focused on the risks of impersonation of public officials in the context of the US 2022 midterm elections, and have made the decision not to launch Verification for Twitter Blue until after Election Day.”
Going ahead, he mentioned, Twitter ought to make investments extra in identification verification — along with making certain people are behind accounts on the positioning. The $8 per thirty days cost would in all probability assist the positioning’s efforts to struggle spam perpetrated by nonhuman accounts, however there was nonetheless work to be carried out to make sure that accounts are tied to the folks claiming to be behind them.
“No solution to identity is perfect, and we’re iterating quickly to come up with the best approach here,” he mentioned.
Cat Zakrzewski contributed to this report.