Billionaire Elon Musk is again pulling politics into his recent Twitter acquisition.
In late April, he secured a deal with the Twitter board of directors to buy the company for $44 billion dollars after text messages between him and Twitter chair Bret Taylor were made public, revealing that Musk had offered to try to buy the company for $54.20 a share.
On Friday, the Tesla CEO revealed that his plan to buy Twitter for $44 billion dollars is on hold… for now.
Elon Musk Says Twitter Acquisition Is ‘Temporarily On Hold’
Twitter deal temporarily on hold pending details supporting calculation that spam/fake accounts do indeed represent less than 5% of usershttps://t.co/Y2t0QMuuyn
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 13, 2022
On Friday morning, Musk tweeted, “Twitter deal temporarily on hold pending details supporting calculation that spam/fake accounts do indeed represent less than 5% of users.”
He attached a link to a Reuters article that cited a recent Twitter regulatory finding on the revenue generated by active accounts. The filing estimates how many of its “monetizable daily active users” were bot or spam amounts. 229 million Twitter users had some kind of advertising pop up on their feed in Twitter’s first quarter. Therefore, five percent of those users would amount to 11.45 million.
The SpaceX founder later followed up by saying that he doesn’t plan to back out of the deal, although it looks like he might be trying to get a discount on his Twitter acquisition. On Saturday, he took to Twitter to joking about “owning the libs.”
Musk May Just Be Trying To Stir The Pot With His Latest Tweet
Whoever thought owning the libs would be cheap never tried to acquire a social media company!
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 14, 2022
Musk knows that his tweets have a tendency of riling people up, and that was probably his intention behind his latest tweets. “Whoever thought owning the libs would be cheap never tried to acquire a social media company!” he tweeted on Saturday.
At least, that’s what the lib hivemind thinks haha
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 14, 2022
He later followed it up with, “At least, that’s what the lib hivemind thinks haha.”
For Twitter to deserve public trust, it must be politically neutral, which effectively means upsetting the far right and the far left equally
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 27, 2022
However, back in late April, Musk had called on the social media site to be politically neutral. “For Twitter to deserve public trust, it must be politically neutral, which effectively means upsetting the far right and the far left equally,” he tweeted.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 28, 2022
A day later, Musk tweeted a photo of his political views. In 2008, he revealed that he was standing just to the left of the center, closer to “my fellow liberal” and further away from the “conservative” stick figure drawing.
In 2012, he’s even closer to the center line. The “my fellow liberal?” stick figure is running away, while the conservative stands perfectly still.
In 2021, the conservative is still in place, saying “LOL!” and Musk is now to the right of the center line. The stick figure on the far left is now labeled a “woke ‘progressive’” and has a speech bubble saying, “Bigot!”
Many were quick to point to the conservative shift brought on by Donald Trump’s MAGA crowd, but Musk again took aim at the “far left” in a follow-up tweet a day later.
But I’m no fan of the far right either.
Let’s have less hate and more love.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 29, 2022
“The far left hates everyone, themselves included!” he tweeted. He later added, “But I’m no fan of the far right either. Let’s have less hate and more love.”
Considering his recent joke today about “owning the libs,” it remains to be seen how much Musk is willing to practice what he preaches.
