All through historical past, the world’s richest folks — nearly all males — have typically operated from the shadows, taking over governments they don’t like quietly.
Not the world’s present richest man.
In current months, Elon Musk has taken on authorities after authorities, largely left or liberal administrations, in public on-line wars centred round his declare that they’re curbing free speech. However typically, the spats have additionally come amid makes an attempt by governments to control social media — the place Musk, the proprietor of X, has a direct enterprise curiosity as effectively.
From Brazil to Australia, France to the UK, and naturally the USA, right here’s a have a look at the battles Musk has stirred, and the way they’ve performed out for him and his firms.
Brazil
Latin America’s largest nation and financial system banned X in August after Musk refused to adjust to a courtroom order to nominate a authorized consultant in Brazil.
The courtroom had additionally ordered X to dam a sequence of far-right accounts. Musk had rejected that demand too, clashing publicly with Supreme Courtroom Justice Alexandre de Moraes.
However the choose didn’t again down both. Along with the ban, he ordered X to pay greater than $3m in fines. The courtroom additionally froze the Brazilian financial institution accounts of Starlink, Musk’s satellite tv for pc communications agency.
Then, on the choose’s order, the Brazilian authorities transferred $1.3m from X’s native checking account and $2m from Starlink’s native checking account to settle the high-quality.
Musk first tried to bypass the ban: for a short interval final week, X was on-line once more in Brazil, after the social media platform rewired how its servers are accessed. However de Moraes threatened it with a every day high-quality for flouting the ban, and X quickly went darkish once more.
Ultimately, the multi-billionaire seems to have accepted defeat — a minimum of for now. Final week, X’s attorneys advised the Brazilian Supreme Courtroom that the corporate would appoint a authorized consultant within the nation and block the accounts accused of spreading hate speech and disinformation in its bid to get X out there within the nation once more.
There’s lots at stake: Brazil is X’s third-largest market with 21 million customers.
Australia
Throughout the Pacific Ocean from Brazil, Musk described the Australian authorities as “fascists” in an X submit after its centre-left Labor Occasion administration introduced laws that will high-quality media platforms 5 p.c of world income for spreading info that’s “moderately verifiable as false, deceptive or misleading and fairly prone to trigger or contribute to critical hurt”.
“Misinformation and disinformation pose a critical menace to the protection and wellbeing of Australians, in addition to to our democracy, society and financial system. Doing nothing and permitting this downside to fester isn’t an choice,” Communications Minister Michelle Rowland stated final week.
Musk’s argument, once more – that the regulation goes towards the precept of free speech.
Musk isn’t the one critic of the brand new laws. David Coleman, shadow minister of communications, had considerations too.
“On this invoice, when you’re an instructional, one thing you say mainly can’t be misinformation. However when you’re an abnormal Australian who disagrees with an instructional, it may be misinformation,” Coleman stated final week.
However the Australian authorities has in flip accused Musk of being inconsistent on the matter of free speech. The X proprietor, his critics say, has accepted calls from right-wing or authoritarian governments to crack down on many accounts.
“Elon Musk’s had extra positions on free speech than the Kama Sutra. You already know, when it’s, in its business pursuits, he’s the champion of free speech and when it doesn’t prefer it, he’s, you understand, he’s going to close all of it down,” Authorities Companies Minister Invoice Shorten stated in an interview on 9 Community’s At present breakfast present.
France
Final month, Telegram CEO Pavel Durov was arrested at a Paris airport after arriving from Azerbaijan. In keeping with Paris authorities, he was arrested after which detained on account of failure to control alleged drug trafficking, organised crime, “terrorism” and fraud on his on-line messaging platform.
Musk, in a sequence of X posts, criticised the arrest. In a sarcastic submit, replying to the breaking story of Durov’s arrest, he wrote, “POV: It’s 2030 in Europe and also you’re being executed for liking a meme”.
POV: It’s 2030 in Europe and also you’re being executed for liking a meme https://t.co/OkZ6YS3u2P
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 24, 2024
He posted a #FreePavel on X a number of hours after Durov’s arrest.
Musk later took to X to criticise fellow multi-billionaire Mark Zuckerberg, responding to a submit questioning why the Meta CEO hasn’t confronted authorized penalties for allegations just like these towards Durov.
Russia, the place Durov was born, imposed a ban on Telegram in 2018 after the app refused to adjust to a courtroom mandate requiring it to supply entry to its encryption keys. Nevertheless, the ban was finally lifted in 2020.
UK
Early in August, Musk ensnared himself in one other disagreement on X, this time with UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer, after far-right and anti-immigration riots throughout Britain.
Responding to a submit suggesting that mass migration and open borders had been in charge for the riots, Musk posted: “Civil war is inevitable”.
The UK authorities hit again. “There’s no justification for feedback like that,” a spokesperson for Starmer advised reporters. “What we’ve seen on this nation is organised, violent thuggery that has no place, both on our streets or on-line. We’re speaking a few minority of thugs that don’t communicate for Britain … I believe you possibly can inform from that that the prime minister doesn’t share these sentiments.”
Musk would additional antagonise Starmer with yet one more X submit, with the hashtag #TwoTierKier — a time period popularised by Reform UK chief Nigel Farage — implying that individuals on the far proper are policed extra closely than these on the left.
Why aren’t all communities protected in Britain? @Keir_Starmer https://t.co/gldyguysNe
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 6, 2024
London Metropolitan Police Commissioner Mark Rowley pushed again on Musk’s feedback in an interview with Sky Information, saying, “We’ve commentators from both finish of the political spectrum who wish to throw accusations of bias on the police as a result of we stand within the center, we function independently beneath the regulation with out concern or favour … The intense voices who echo these are of extra concern to me as a result of the danger is … they legitimise the violence that the officers I’m sending [out] in the present day, will face on the streets … they’re placing them in danger.”
US
Musk stated earlier he voted for President Joe Biden in 2020, however forward of the 2024 election, he has made clear that he backs former President Donald Trump.
On X, he has referred to as Biden a “damp sock puppet”, and criticised the president’s insurance policies on immigration and well being.
In November 2023, after a Musk submit the place he appeared in charge Jews for mass immigration into the US, the White Home described his feedback as “abhorrent”, “racist” and “anti-Semitic”.
However he has additionally labored with the US authorities to supply Starlink satellite tv for pc entry to Ukraine amid its struggle with Russia — although in current months, Kyiv has alleged that Moscow’s forces too have accessed the service through third nations.
Most just lately, following the second alleged assassination try on Trump, an X account consumer requested: “Why [do] they wish to kill Donald Trump?”
In a now-deleted submit, Musk responded, “And nobody is even attempting to assassinate Biden/Kamala.”
The remark drew a firestorm of criticism for Musk, together with from the White Home.