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Independents have been known to swing elections and new Twitter owner Elon Musk has not been shy about who he thinks they should vote for.
“To independent-minded voters: Shared power curbs the worst excesses of both parties, therefore I recommend voting for a Republican Congress, given that the Presidency is Democratic,” Musk tweeted on Monday, Nov. 7, two days before the midterms.
Musk expounded on his request in a follow-up tweet writing, “Hardcore Democrats or Republicans never vote for the other side, so independent voters are the ones who actually decide who’s in charge!” Musk continued.
He pinned the first tweet to his timeline and further explained why he advocated for Independents to vote for Republicans on elections day.
“While it’s true that I’ve been under unfair & misleading attack for some time by leading Democrats, my motivation here is for centrist governance, which matches the interests of most Americans,” Musk tweeted in response to a user who said his support of Republicans was “justified.”
Responses to Musk’s tweets were varied.
Journalist Kanishka Raj Singh reminded the Tesla founder of one of his tweets in April when he called for neutrality on social media platforms.
“For Twitter to deserve public trust, it must be politically neutral, which effectively means upsetting the far right and the far left equally,” Musk tweeted on April 27.
“Hi @elonmusk, in this tweet in April, you said Twitter should be politically neutral,” Raj wrote along with a link to Musk’s tweet. “How would you, as the head of Twitter, justify recommending which party people should vote for after you advocated for political neutrality for the platform?”
“As long as the platform itself isn’t weighted one way or the other (shadow bans and content moderation of valid political statements) he should be able to have any opinions he wants. Imo,” @jeffyb101 wrote.
PHOTO: Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk arrives on the red carpet for the Axel Springer media award in Berlin on Dec. 1, 2020. Musk suggested in a Saturday, Oct. 15, 2022, tweet that his rocket company SpaceX may continue to fund its satellite-based Starlink internet service in Ukraine. But Musk’s tone and wording also raised the possibility that the irascible Tesla CEO was just being sarcastic. (Hannibal Hanschke/Pool Photo via AP, File)
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