Elon Musk Celebrates Trump’s Expected Victory with AI Imagery on X

Elon Musk, the owner of X, formerly known as Twitter, expressed his excitement over Donald Trump’s anticipated triumph in the upcoming US presidential election. He took to his social media platform to share an artificial intelligence-generated image of himself carrying a sink into the White House, captioned with the phrase: “Let that sink in.” This phrase cleverly referenced his acquisition of the platform.

Musk has consistently shown his support for Trump, utilizing X as a platform to vocalize his political beliefs. Following the election, he noted on X that there was “record usage” of the platform, stating, “you are the media now.” However, various studies have indicated that many of his posts have propagated false or misleading claims regarding the US election, raising concerns about the integrity of information shared on the platform.

According to a recent report from the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), at least 87 of Musk’s posts this year have promoted claims about the US election that have been rated as false or misleading by fact-checkers, collectively garnering an astonishing 1.7 billion views.

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The CCDH report further highlighted that Musk’s posts achieved double the viewership compared to all political advertisements on X combined during the election season, estimating this engagement to be equivalent to spending around $24 million (€22 million) on campaign advertisements. Notably, one false claim Musk made regarding swing states and “voter importation” alone attracted 21 million views.

New research has also suggested that Musk may have altered X’s algorithm to enhance the visibility of his posts since January, particularly to promote pro-Trump content. The study found that starting in July, there was a dramatic and significant surge in engagement with Musk’s X account, with view counts for his posts rising by 138 percent, retweets increasing by 238 percent, and likes growing by 186 percent. Many of these posts either endorsed the Republican candidate or sought to undermine Democratic candidate Kamala Harris.

The spike in engagement for Musk’s posts occurred at a rate significantly higher than that of other prominent political accounts on the platform. “These findings underscore a distinct pattern that may indicate an algorithmic shift that disproportionately favored Musk’s account, contributing to a considerable engagement advantage,” the researchers concluded.

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“Musk’s actions have shattered the illusion that social media platforms like X are neutral,” the researchers added. “Given his previous adjustments to X’s algorithm to amplify his posts, it would indeed be surprising if he were not skewing the platform in favor of Trump, whom he perceives as ‘the path to prosperity.’”

Musk acquired Twitter in 2022 and had reportedly mobilized a team last year to algorithmically enhance the reach of his posts, as detailed in a report by The Verge.

Euronews Next has reached out to X for comments regarding both studies but did not receive a response at the time of publication.