Elon Musk, Twitter's Possible New Owner, Has Disappeared From Twitter

Billionaire Elon Musk has been suspiciously absent from Twitter for the last week.

His very last tweet is a viral picture that shows the price of gas and diesel matching the 7-11 storefront.

In fact, Musk has been so quiet that his now 100.3 million Twitter followers might have even missed his birthday on June 28, when he turned 51.

His mother, Maye Musk, tweeted, "Happy birthday @elonmusk ?? Thank you for making the world a better place in the past 1/4 century? #ProudMom."

It's starting to seem likely that Elon Musk is starting to experience the fallout from earlier this month when SpaceX fired several employees who wrote an open letter condemning his Twitter usage.

The open letter written by SpaceX employees was first reported by The Verge. In the letter, the employees describe Musk’s behavior on social media as “a frequent source of distraction and embarrassment for us, particularly in recent weeks.”

The employees even cited SpaceX’s “No A--hole” policy and asks the company to “publicly address and condemn Elon’s harmful Twitter behavior.” The letter stated:

“As our CEO and most prominent spokesperson, Elon is seen as the face of SpaceX — every Tweet that Elon sends is a de facto public statement by the company. It is critical to make clear to our teams and to our potential talent pool that his messaging does not reflect our work, our mission, or our values.”

However, by the next day, The New York Times reported that multiple employees who had written the letter were fired after SpaceX president Gwynne Shotwell sent out an email criticizing the open letter.

“The letter, solicitations, and general process made employees feel uncomfortable, intimidated and bullied, and/or angry because the letter pressured them to sign onto something that did not reflect their views,” Shotwell alleged, adding, “We have too much critical work to accomplish and no need for this kind of overreaching activism.”

One employee who helped write the letter asked The Verge to remain anonymous. They said that the general consensus was that Shotwell’s email was “tone-deaf.” The employee also said that workers spent over a “month of dedicated hard work and soliciting feedback to try and make sure we got as much input as possible.”

It could be that SpaceX finally talked to Elon Musk about his Twitter behavior, which is what led to his disappearance. It's also possible that the pending lawsuit against him could be a deciding factor in his Twitter absence.

According to Reuters, the lawsuit was filed in federal court in Manhattan on Thursday, June 16. The plaintiff, Keith Johnson, is accusing Musk of driving up the price of Dogecoin and then letting it drop. Since Musk is the CEO of Tesla and the founder and CEO of SpaceX, Johnson is also naming those two companies in his lawsuit.

The complaint reads: “Defendants were aware since 2019 that Dogecoin had no value yet promoted Dogecoin to profit from its trading.” It goes on to say that “Musk used his pedestal as World's Richest man to operate and manipulate the Dogecoin Pyramid Scheme for profit, exposure, and amusement.”

Elon Musk has been frequently criticized in the past for using his tweets to influence the stock market, especially in regard to his Tesla shares.

However, it's possible that his Twitter disappearance might be slightly more personal. Just ahead of his disappearance, his daughter, Vivian Wilson, got her name and gender change approved. Vivian wanted to change her last name from "Musk" to "Wilson," which is her mother, Justine's maiden name.

Musk and Justine were married from 2000 to 2008 and had several children together. Justine has voiced her support for her daughter on Twitter, while Musk has, and it seems, will remain, silent.