The world’s richest man now owns the world’s most powerful communications platform.
But even with Elon Musk’s vow to make Twitter a platform for free speech, civil rights advocates fear the takeover will mean it will become a safe haven for hateful trolls and conspiracy theorists — including former President Donald Trump, despite his saying he’d rather stick with his own floundering platform Truth Social.
Musk, CEO of Tesla and founder of SpaceX worth roughly $265 billion, moved into cyberspace Monday by acquiring Twitter for $44 billion. So what’s next?
The takeover had the NAACP worried, and the civil rights organization released a personal plea: “Mr. Musk: free speech is wonderful, hate speech is unacceptable. Disinformation, misinformation and hate speech have NO PLACE on Twitter. Do not allow 45 to return to the platform. Do not allow Twitter to become a petri dish for hate speech, or falsehoods that subvert our democracy.”
Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt told the Daily News he’s “cautiously optimistic, but certainly wary” about how Musk will wield the power he suddenly holds.
“We’ve seen Elon Musk build a car business that’s better for the planet, a (space travel) business that’s focused in creating new possibilities around the universe...” Greenblatt said. “Is it impossible that he won’t try and create a healthier public conversation? I hope he will.”
Greenblatt, who worked in tech before running the nation’s oldest anti-hate group, supports Musk's move as a capitalist. He also hopes Musk won’t undo the progress Twitter has made in curtailing the spread of hate speech and misinformation.
“Antisemitism and hate online is not just a stakeholder problem, it’s no longer a shareholder problem, it’s a societal problem,” he said.
Angelo Carusone, who runs the left-leaning watchdog group Media Matters for America, is less hopeful.
“It’s really bad,” Carusone said. “It’s actually really bad.”
He worries Musk could use tactics like manipulating logarithms to push right-wing ideology. He’s concerned that rather than providing a fair and balanced playing field, Musk will make Twitter the Fox News of the social media world, promoting commentary that’s almost exclusively conservative as a “counter-balance” to mainstream media content those viewers see as overtly liberal.
He also worries that right-wing antagonists defined by their need to troll people who don’t share their ideology will abandon the platforms they began using when Twitter started cracking down on hate speech and return in droves.
“The right-wingers are very excited about this,” Carusone said.
One Truth Social investor who claims he’s not coming back to Twitter is the 45th president. According to Fox News, Trump — who was banned from Twitter following the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol — has vowed to stick with the troubled social media platform he’s been working to launch since October.
“I hope Elon buys Twitter because he’ll make improvements to it and he is a good man, but I am going to be staying on TRUTH,” Trump said.
Truth Social has experienced significant technical issues that prohibited the platform from achieving its goal of a full rollout by the end of March. Trump reportedly plans to finally start “TRUTHing” this weekend.
Twitter, like other social media companies, enjoys “the broad immunities of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act for civil liability for any speech that is made on that platform, so Musk would bear little risk if he allowed Trump back on,” added trial attorney Christa Ramey who has litigated cyberbullying cases.
American Civil Liberties Union executive director Anthony J. Romero praised Musk as an “ACLU card-carrying member and one of our most significant supporters,” but wonders if the 50-year-old businessman — who says he intends to make Twitter private — may be holding too many cards.
“We should be worried about any powerful central actor, whether it’s a government or any wealthy individual – even if it’s an ACLU member — having so much control over the boundaries of our political speech online,” Romero said in a statement.
UltraViolet communications director Bridgett Todd worries Musk’s Twitter takeover will make the platform a “more dangerous place for women” and wants Congress to get involved.
“This is proof that Big Tech cannot regulate itself,” she said of Twitter selling to Musk.
Musk tweeted Monday that the mixed reaction to his takeover is exactly what he had in mind when he bought it.
“I hope that even my worst critics remain on Twitter, because that is what free speech means,” he wrote.
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