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Elon Musk has built an army of pro-Trump extremists to spread voter fraud conspiracy theories

Posted on by Nargang
Elon Musk has built an army of pro-Trump extremists to spread voter fraud conspiracy theories

Elon Musk’s social media platform X has been a major vehicle for spreading countless lies this election season, including fake stories about Haitian immigrants eating petsAI videos falsely accusing Tim Walz of sexual assaultthe idea that the deep state is trying to do kill trumpand accusations that Democrats can control hurricanesto name just a few. But almost everyone expects disinformation efforts to get even worse on Election Day and beyond, as new reports from Pr and wired highlights the incredibly unethical work of Musk’s pro-Trump political action committee, America PAC.

As new reports show, America PAC recently formed a group on X called Electoral Integrity Communitywhich includes a biography explaining that the purpose is to “Share possible incidents of voter fraud or irregularities you see while voting in the 2024 election.” The feed includes an endless stream of conspiracy theories and unverified reports, all with a pro-Trump or anti-Harris slant. And there is real concern that this seemingly endless stream of nonsense will have an impact on how the election is perceived online. At the time of writing, the group has over 50,000 members.

One example of a tweet that was shared and amplified by the so-called Election Integrity Community was from an account called MJTruthUltra, which claims that someone “threw away an obscene amount of ballots” at a location in Pennsylvania. The account tried to suggest there was something fishy about the video, which has been shared more than 7 million times.

NBC News CHECKED that the video shows a man named Charles Narciso, who has been with the US Postal Service for 25 years, delivering ballots to a local election office. It’s unclear who is behind the MJTruthUltra account, but it also shared conspiracy theories about the assassination attempt against Trump in July, including the idea that the shooter was brainwashed by the CIA. But whoever is behind it, the video has been helped by some of the biggest names in the conspiracy theory world, including Alex Jones, who tweeted: “Not even trying to hide it!”

The purpose of these videos is not necessarily to prove that anything illegal happened that would alter the vote in a significant way. But if Trump’s allies can sow enough confusion, perhaps many people will see this wall of static and noise online and assume that something shady must be going on. How can you doubt that election fraud is happening when so many people are shouting about it on the internet? It can’t all be untrue, can it? As Steve Bannon so infamously said, they’re trying to “flood the area with shit.” Bannon was released from prison this week, just in time for the election.

NPR also notes that it appears that establishing this community of “fact checkers” on X is an attempt to lay the groundwork for any future lawsuits challenging the validity of the election results. And it’s already taken for granted that Trump will claim that any result where he didn’t win is rigged. He obviously does this on a daily basis and falsely said that fraud is already happening in Pennsylvania, a crucial battleground state.

“Pennsylvania is cheating and being caught, on a scale rarely seen before. REPORT FRAUD TO THE AUTHORITIES. Law enforcement must act, NOW!” Trump posted on his social media platform Truth Social on Wednesday.

Trump’s wealthy allies are doing everything they can to get him back in office. Musk, a far-right billionaire, has invested at least $120 million in Trump’s election, according to the latest reports from New York Times. And Musk’s PAC America is offering $1 million a day to people who sign his “petition” in support of the First and Second Amendments. The caveat is that only people living in one of the seven battleground states are eligible, prompting Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner to file a lawsuit. against America PAC arguing that an illegal lottery is being run.

Money aside, Musk has really stepped up his rhetoric over the past six months, echoing Trump’s dour and gloom talking points and insisting that this will be America’s last real election if Harris wins. Musk, who told Tucker Carlson it might be thrown into prison if Harris takes the White House, he also suggested that members of Congress who do not support certain Republican policies should be executed. Musk has been tweeting since July about the proposed SAVE Act, a bill introduced by Republicans to raise all kinds of new barriers to voting.

“Those who oppose this are traitors. All caps: TRAITORS What is the punishment for traitors again?” Musk tweeted with a clear implication for all. Traitors have historically been executed.

Meanwhile, Trump is throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks. The former president, who suggested that Mark Milley should be executed for treason and Mark Zuckerberg should be thrown in jail, filed a lawsuit Thursday against CBS News for “fraudulent Ph.D” from a 60 Minutes interview with Kamala Harris. Deceptive editing is not a crime, of course, but Trump argues that it amounts to some kind of election interference with the underlying crime being false or deceptive advertising in commerce. It’s absurd, but the point is to intimidate and harass, not necessarily win.

Musk’s X will continue to churn out silly conspiracy theories about voter fraud, almost certainly attesting to the baseless allegations until Election Day on November 5th. The thing no one knows right now is what these people do if Trump loses. The former president did not accept his loss in 2020 and even tried to stage a coup d’état in the US Capitol to stay in power. There’s no telling what he might do this time, and Musk seems ready to help anyway he can.