Tesla CEO Elon Musk bashed former President Donald Trump’s Truth Social platform, calling it “essentially a rightwing echo chamber,” adding, “it might as well be called Trumpet.” The two have been feuding with Trump labeling the social media hypemaster a “bullshit artist” at a July rally.
In a recent interview with Financial Times, Musk talked about why he wants to buy Twitter, stating, “I’m not doing Twitter for the money.”
“It’s not like I’m trying to buy some yacht and I can’t afford it. I don’t own any boats. But I think it’s important that people have a maximally trusted and inclusive means of exchanging ideas and that it should be as trusted and transparent as possible,” he added.
“Twitter is certainly an invitation to increase your pain level,” Musk acknowledged, adding, “I guess I must be a masochist.”
But abandoning Twitter to create separate social media platforms, Musk says, would mean splintering public debate into different bubbles, which he believes Trump’s Truth Social is doing.
“It [Truth Social] is essentially a rightwing echo chamber,” Musk said. “It might as well be called Trumpet.”
In recent months, Trump and Musk have been engaging in a public feud.
At a rally in Alaska in July, Trump called Musk a “bullshit artist,” referring to the Tesla CEO pulling out of his deal to buy Twitter, as well as Musk’s recent admission that he had never voted for a Republican until he voted for Mayra Flores in the special election for Texas’s 34th Congressional District over the summer.
“He’s got himself a mess, you know, he said the other day, ‘I’ve never voted for a Republican.’ I said I didn’t know that. He told me he voted for me. So he’s another bullshit artist but he’s not going to be buying it, although he might later,” Trump said.
Trump also told Breitbart News in July that he knew Musk would not actually acquire Twitter — despite the hype.
Musk responded to Trump’s criticism by saying he doesn’t “hate the man,” but that it was time for “Trump to hang up his hat & sail into the sunset.”
Trump reacted to Musk’s criticism by taking to his Truth Social platform to proclaim that the Tesla CEO would be “worthless” without government subsidies.
“When Elon Musk came to the White House asking me for help on all of his many subsidized projects, whether it’s electric cars that don’t drive long enough, driverless cars that crash, or rocketships to nowhere, without which subsidies he’d be worthless, and telling me how he was a big Trump fan and Republican,” Trump said.
You can follow Alana Mastrangelo on Facebook and Twitter at @ARmastrangelo, and on Instagram.
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