The way the world’s richest man, Elon Musk, is getting involved in US politics shows how billionaires with control over social media can sway public opinion and influence elections.

“Since Elon Musk took control of X, the platform has turned into a hellscape of hate and misinformation. — a lot of it comes from Mr. Musk himself,” Imran Ahmed, head of the Center to Combat Digital Hate (CCDH), told DW.

Unlike most tech billionaires and political donors, Musk’s political involvement is highly visible and has intensified ahead of the November 5 US presidential election. CCDH report found that Musk’s false or misleading claims about the US election garnered 1.2 billion views between January and July 2024 on the social media platform X (formerly Twitter), which he owns.

Musk’s role as a source of disinformation and disinformation extends beyond his own posts. He frequently retweets or interacts with false and misleading claims and conspiracy theories, and his engagement gives these posts immense reach.

Here are three examples of how Musk is spreading false claims ahead of the US election.

1: False narratives about the migrant vote

Claim: In July, Republican President Mike Johnson suggested Democrats “want to turn illegal aliens into voters.” Musk retweeted that claim, adding that “the goal was to import as many illegal voters as possible,” meaning immigrants are brought into the country to support Democrats. The post received more than 45 likes millions of views.

DW Fact Check: False

Only US citizens can vote in US federal elections. “Non-citizens, including legal permanent residents, cannot vote in federal, state and local elections,” explains a statement on USA.gov, an official US government website. Federal law strictly prohibits non-citizens from voting in US presidential elections.

Musk has, too he stated it takes “less than five minutes and zero paperwork” with an application to be approved as an illegal immigrant and flown into the US at US taxpayer expense. Musk posted a video claiming that using the CBP One app, an unlimited number of foreigners could enter the US. The app was developedby US Customs and Border Protection and is used to schedule appointments for asylum processing. However, simply registering on the app does not guarantee entry into the US.

Still, Musk’s post has been viewed nearly 20 million times and shared tens of thousands of times.

Under the US immigration law, eligible individuals must apply for asylum while physically present in the US, and the decision process typically takes years.

2: Posting fake photos of Kamala Harris

Claim: In early September, Musk POSTED an image showing Democratic candidate Kamala Harris dressed in a red communist outfit with a hammer and sickle on her hat, with the caption: “Kamala vows to be a communist dictator on day one. Can you believe she’s wearing that outfit!?” This post quickly went viral, reaching over 80 million views.

DW Fact Check: False.

This is not an actual picture of Harris. The photo was generated by artificial intelligence, as evidenced by the sharpness of Harris’s image against a blurred background and unusually bright colors. An advanced AI image detector tool such as truemedia.org finds “substantial evidence of manipulation.”

Sander van der Linden, a professor at Cambridge University in the UK and author of the book “Foolproof: Why Misinformation Infects Our Minds and How to Build Immunity,” told DW that misinformation erodes the quality of democratic discourse, lowers confidence in the electoral process and the outcome, “and for some people it may even change the way they vote.”

With a net worth of over USD 263 billion (EUR 242 billion) from November, according to ForbesMusk is the richest person in the world, making him a unique influencer. He has a major social media presence with over 200 million followers. By comparison, Taylor Swift has over 500 million followers.

Since acquiring Twitter two years ago and renaming it X, Musk has done things like reintroduce former President Donald Trump’s account, which was suspended following Trump’s controversial posts after the last 2020 presidential election, which he lost. Trump has more than 92 million followers on X and less than 8 million on his own social media platform Social Truth.

3: Questioning the electoral process

Musk amplified claims that something is amiss with voter rolls in Michigan, a swing state. The initial claim — that Michigan has more voters than residents eligible to vote — it was disproved by of Michigan Electoral facts center.

Claim: Musk it doubled in mid-October and accused Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson of dishonesty, writing, “You only plan to remove ineligible voters AFTER the election. This necessarily means that there are many more people registered to vote than eligible voters”.

DW Fact Check: Deceptive.

Under the state and US federal law, voters are removed from the voter rolls only after they have been sent notice that their registration is subject to cancellation and two subsequent federal election cycles have passed without any response or voting activity.

“Michigan has done more in the past five years to improve the accuracy of our voter rolls than in the past two decades,” the state said. says on its election information website. “Since 2019, election officials have canceled more than 800,000 voter registrations and identified more than 600,000 voters scheduled for cancellation in 2025 and 2027 once the statutory two-cycle federal election period has passed.”

What motivates Musk?

Musk and Trump have a complex relationship. During Trump’s 2016 campaign, Musk publicly askedTrump’s fitness for office. Trump then later appointedMusk for his advisory board, a role Musk eventually the leftbecause of political disagreements.

Van der Linden, of the University of Cambridge, believes Musk believes a Trump victory would be in the best interests of his business. It could include “potentially more NASA contracts for SpaceX, more federal contracts for Starlink, and free range to run X as it wants without government oversight of social media companies,” he said.

BR24’s Michael Schlegel contributed to this piece.

Edited by: Joscha Weber, Sarah Steffen