Musk and other pro-Trump billionaires fuel partisan storylines about the shooting

A chorus of right-leaning tech and business leaders, led by X owner Elon Musk, used their online megaphones in the wake of Saturday’s attack to criticize the Secret Service’s diversity initiatives, condemn Democratic donor Reid Hoffman, and make unsubstantiated allegations about the shooting.

The claims by powerful business leaders with large online followings helped influence the direction of platform itself, as well as the storylines viewed by millions of people. Musk’s post endorsing Trump after the shooting received the most engagement of any post on X related to the attempted assassination, said Graham Brookie, the Atlantic Council’s vice president for technology programs and strategy. The post received more than 118 million views and 332,000 retweets, surpassing a post from Barack Obama that said there was “no place” for violence in democracy. By Saturday night, the terms “Deep State” and “antifa” were among the top trending topics across X, formerly known as Twitter.

Brookie said the political moment marked a “return to primacy” for X - a platform that saw an exodus of left-leaning users after Musk’s acquisition of the service. X, meanwhile, lavished in the attention it had received in the hours after the shooting, posting the words “global town square.”

Musk took to X to formally endorse former president Donald Trump’s candidacy after the shooting Saturday, as did billionaire hedge fund owner Bill Ackman, a longtime supporter of Democratic candidates who has been critical of President Biden. Members of Musk’s inner circle, including venture capitalists David Sacks and Shaun Maguire, have thrown their weight behind Trump in recent months, but Musk appeared to hold out. Like Ackman, he supported Biden in 2020, and the shift from both men underscores how significantly the political landscape in business and tech has transformed in just a few short years.

Musk, turning to a familiar refrain of his, appeared to point the finger for the security breach at Diversity, Equity and Inclusion efforts - amplifying a post that ridiculed the U.S. Secret Service’s director for what it called “diversity hires.” The argument is being made on many right-wing political accounts, which have also called out individual female secret service agents. Musk had previously directed that argument at the airline industry, drawing condemnation over the insinuation that diversity efforts left the skies less safe, news outlets reported.

“It will take an airplane crashing and killing hundreds of people for them to change this crazy policy of DIE,” Musk wrote, in what appeared to be a deliberate misspelling.

Musk, along with Sacks - an investor friend, podcast host and Trump supporter - used the platform to vilify influential Democrat and fellow Silicon Valley titan Reid Hoffman.

Musk taunted Hoffman, referencing a spat that took place earlier in the week between Hoffman and billionaire investor Peter Thiel at Allen and Co. Conference in Sun Valley, Idaho.

While onstage at the conference, Hoffman reportedly took Thiel to task for his support of Trump in previous elections. According to the outlet Puck, Thiel sarcastically thanked Hoffman for funding lawsuits against Trump because they had turned him into “a martyr,” increasing his reelection odds. Hoffman then retorted, “Yeah, I wish I had made him an actual martyr.”

“The Reid Hoffman’s of the world got their dearest wish … but then the martyr lived,” Musk wrote on Saturday, in a post that garnered around 24 million views.

Sacks, the “All-In” podcast host who endorsed Trump earlier this year after supporting several rival candidates, recently held a fundraiser for Trump in San Francisco (Musk did not attend). Sacks also took Hoffman to task for his martyr comment.

Hoffman, in a statement posted to X on Sunday, condemned political violence and said his words had been taken out of context. Hoffman said he’d told Thiel he’d “wished that Trump would martyr himself - meaning let himself be held accountable - for his assaults on and lies about women. Of course I meant nothing about any sort of physical harm or violence, which I categorically deplore.”

The post garnered around a million views by Sunday afternoon, a fraction of the reach of Musk’s original claim.

Musk, who has been encouraged by his inner circle to endorse Trump but had wavered until recent days, is the most followed person on his platform, with about 190 million followers.

But even as Twitter has emerged as a powerful destination for people seeking information and perspectives during a confusing political moment, changes that have been made to the platform since Musk’s takeover made it more challenging to find accurate information, Brookie noted.

Users can now pay for blue check marks - which were once a badge reserved to identify public figures and journalists - making it more difficult to discern the source of claims on the platform. The word “staged” and other topics related to conspiracy theories also trended. “It’s a much more polluted information environment,” he said.

In a post viewed by nearly 70 million users, Musk described the Secret Service’s actions as “incompetence or it was deliberate” and called on agency leaders to resign.

After Ackman issued his endorsement, Musk then reposted his message, as did Maguire, a venture capitalist with Sequoia Capital and friend of Musk, who praised “people that are willing to change their minds as new data comes in.”

Maguire later posted - without providing evidence - that the shooter “will almost certainly be discovered to be a member” of the left-wing group antifa.

Authorities identified the shooter as 20-year-old Thomas Matthew Crooks, of Bethel Park, Pa. Voter status records showed he was registered as a Republican, The Washington Post has reported.

Musk did not respond to a request for comment.

Hoffman and Maguire declined requests for an interview. Sacks did not respond to a comment request.

On X, right-leaning venture capitalists and entrepreneurs posted that the mood had decidedly shifted toward the former president. Some said that yesterday’s attack would give a broader permission, in liberal Silicon Valley, for people on the fence to openly support Trump.

“People just casually walking around SF with Trump hats,” wrote an executive. “Something has changed.”

“Yes,” Musk replied.

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Cat Zakrzewski contributed to this report.