Elon Musk’s move to abandon his purchase of Twitter was met with a mixture of relief and disappointment across the political spectrum, with many criticizing the Tesla founder but others welcoming his “unveiling” of the influential messaging platform.
The announcement of the $44 billion deal in late April sparked fears the platform would face a surge in abuse and disinformation, after Musk – a self-proclaimed freedom of speech absolutist – said he would largely let anyone say anything Twitter is legal.
Musk’s announcement Friday that he no longer wanted to buy Twitter sparked a celebration from advocacy groups who had launched a campaign to block the world’s richest man from making the purchase.
“A Musk-led Twitter would have opened up Pandora’s box and reopened the floodgates for hatred and baseless conspiracy theories — making the platform and the country a more dangerous place to be,” said Bridget Todd, communications director at UltraViolet, an advocacy group.
The dissolution of the deal “is a welcome respite for women, people of color and members of the LGBTQ+ community.”
Nicole Gill, co-founder and chief executive of left-leaning watchdog Accountable Tech, called Musk’s offer a “chaotic crusade.”
“Our information ecosystem, our security and our democracy cannot be left to the whim of unaccountable billionaires,” she said.
But the hopes of others who believed that Musk’s leadership of the platform would result in a reduction in measures to curb bullying, lying and other abuses deemed politically motivated and opposed to free speech have been dashed.
“The party is really over here. The purge is coming,” Conservative commentator Dave Rubin tweeted.
Donald Trump Jr., the former president’s son, predicted that “censorship” on Twitter will “fall behind tenfold”.
“As of this writing, there’s no chance of free thought or free speech,” he said on his father’s fledgling Truth Social platform, which launched after he was booted from his preferred medium, where he has about 88.7 million had amassed followers.
The former president was banned from Twitter after he was accused of using it to incite his supporters to launch an attack on the US Capitol on January 6 last year.
While Musk said he would lift the elder Trump’s ban, the billionaire said he would stick to Truth Social — a message he reiterated on Friday.
“The Twitter deal is dead, long live the ‘truth,'” he posted on Truth Social.
Another conservative Twitter competitor, GETTR, also took the opportunity to tout itself as an alternative platform that would “protect freedom of expression online”.
CEO Jason Miller commended Musk “for continuing to expose the incurable, rotting, politically discriminatory culture” within Twitter.
The deal may have fallen through, but the tug-of-war between Musk and Twitter is far from over as the company says it will take legal action to enforce the agreement.
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