According to a report by the Center for Countering Digital Hate, billionaire Elon Musk’s false or misleading claims about the US election have amassed 2 billion views this year on the social media platform X, which he owns. The report highlights that Musk, who supports Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, has made at least 87 posts in 2023 that have been rated as false or misleading by fact-checkers.
One specific claim made by Musk was that there has been a “triple-digit” increase in the number of undocumented immigrants in swing states over the past four years. Since endorsing Trump in July, Musk’s political posts have garnered a staggering 17.1 billion views—twice as many as all political campaign ads recorded by X in the same timeframe, according to the nonprofit.
The Center for Countering Digital Hate estimates that it would cost a political campaign approximately $24 million (€22 million) to achieve the same number of views that Musk’s posts have generated.
