Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, speaks to media representatives on the Tesla Gigafactory building web site In Grünheide close to Berlin, September 3, 2020.
Julian Stähle | image alliance by way of Getty Photographs
Elon Musk on Friday flatly denied a declare by the pinnacle of ex-President Donald Trump‘s new social media firm that Trump had inspired Musk’s bid to purchase Twitter.
“That is false,” Musk tweeted in reply to a New York Post article about that declare by Trump Media & Know-how Group CEO Devin Nunes.
“I’ve had no communication, immediately or not directly, with Trump, who has publicly said that he shall be solely on Reality Social,” wrote Musk, head of Tesla and SpaceX.
Nunes, throughout a televised look Wednesday on Fox Enterprise, stated that Trump’s social media app, Reality Social, was “all for” Musk’s transfer to purchase Twitter and take it private with a $44 billion offer — a considerably eyebrow-raising declare since Twitter is a competitor to Reality Social.
“President Trump, mainly earlier than Elon Musk purchased it, truly stated to go and purchase it as a result of you already know the objective of our firm is actually to construct a group the place individuals are in a household pleasant, protected surroundings,” stated Nunes, a former Republican congressman from California, in the course of the look.
Twitter banned Trump, who had been an obsessive consumer of the platform, in January 2021 for what the corporate stated was the “threat of additional incitement of violence.”
The ban adopted the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot by a mob of Trump supporters who disrupted the certification of President Joe Biden‘s election.
Trump introduced plans to launch Reality Social as a competitor to Twitter final fall, and stated his social media firm would turn into publicly traded by a cope with the so-called blank-check firm Digital World Acquisition.
On April 25, Twitter accepted Musk’s supply to purchase the corporate, which is contingent on approval from shareholders and regulators.
Nunes, throughout his interview on Fox Enterprise, steered that Trump’s purported urging of Musk to purchase Twitter dovetailed with the mission of Reality Social.
“That is why we inspired Elon Musk to purchase it, as a result of somebody has to proceed to tackle these tech tyrants,” Nunes stated. “Donald Trump needed to be sure that the American folks bought their voice again and that the web was open and that is what we’re doing.”
“And so folks like Elon Musk doing what he is doing, you already know we’re undoubtedly in favor of it,” Nunes stated.
In late April, Trump told CNBC’s Joe Kernen that he wouldn’t return to Twitter even when Musk took over and reversed the ban on him.
“No, I will not be going again on Twitter,” stated Trump, who had almost 90 million followers on the platform earlier than the ban.
“I shall be on Reality Social inside the week. It is on schedule. We now have lots of people signed up,” he stated.
“I like Elon Musk. I like him quite a bit. He is a superb particular person. We did quite a bit for Twitter after I was within the White Home. I used to be upset by the best way I used to be handled by Twitter. I will not be going again on Twitter,” Trump stated.
Statistics present that Trump, who as president had averaged upward of eight tweets per day within the final half of 2017 and the primary half of 2018, steadily elevated that common within the following years. He ended up with a median of 34 tweets per day in his final half yr in workplace, earlier than being banned.
On Reality Social, Trump as of Friday had posted a so-called Reality or “ReTruthed” one other consumer’s publish lower than 30 occasions mixed over the previous two months. Almost all of these posts had been made previously week.
Correction: Devin Nunes is CEO of Trump Media & Know-how Group. An earlier model misstated the corporate title.
