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Former President Donald Trump is back in X and Elon Musk is delighted.
In the hours after Musk and Trump’s meandering, misinformation-filled verbal exchange on Tuesday morning, they shared dozens of flattering messages from their followers about the event. In a post now pinned to the top of his timeline, Musk claimed that the exchange of words generated around a billion views, despite the fact that on X Space itself, only 1. 3 million people were listening at most. In addition
The interview contained nothing new, with Trump being the platform to rediscuss old grievances. But for Musk, who is desperate for Trump to return to X, the interview was the successful culmination of years of work to attract the biggest star to his platform.
From the moment he bought X in November 2022, Musk has done everything imaginable to make the platform more welcoming to Trump. Musk has destroyed the acceptance as true of the security team that had first banned Trump and welcomed the former president’s maximum fervor. supporters, as well as disinformation traffickers, anti-Semites, neo-Nazis and white supremacists. Last month, after Trump’s assassination attempt, Musk nevertheless publicly endorsed the GOP presidential nominee.
Although Elon Musk’s turn to the far right would have likely paved the way for Trump’s return, it has turned millions of former users against the platform. In the last 12 months, X has lost 18% of its users. Since Musk took the initiative less than two years ago, only about a quarter of users have left the platform.
“If we forget about the scams that multiply from time to time, the platform’s largest accounts go through the same 8 to 10 million users each month,” Ryan Broderick, founder of the Garbage Day newsletter, wrote earlier this month. the knowledge analyzed through its publication. “The site is completely stalled. “
The loss of advertisers was brutal. Musk’s adherence to conspiracies, and in particular anti-Semitic content, has led advertisers to boycott his platform. Last year, Musk said that advertising profits had fallen 50% in the eight months since he took over the company in late 2022. Musk warned that advertisers abandoning X were blackmailing him; He told them: “them. “He then filed a lawsuit against a global advertising alliance, accusing it of conspiring to bypass his platform and deliberately causing him to lose profits.
At a time when Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris is gaining ground in national polls and state primaries, Trump’s comeback on X has been hailed by his supporters as a return to the platform that helped him achieve victory in 2016. , when each and every Trump message was analyzed and reported. But it’s unclear whether the former president will return to X full-time and return to the workplace at the same pace as before.
In the hours leading up to the verbal exchange on X Spaces, this was the case: Trump posted 10 times about the ban from the platform. for its component in the propagation of electoral conspiracies before the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021.
But Trump, who also stayed hours after the event, returned to Truth Social, the platform he built after being kicked out of X. He shared more than a dozen updates – or “truths” – encouraging his fans to get out and vote. in the Minnesota and Wisconsin primaries for applicants he supported.
Around 1:20 a. m. on Tuesday, hours after the event ended, Trump finally posted a link on Truth Social to a recording of the verbal exchange with Musk. But instead of a direct link to the recording in X, Trump posted a link to a recording of the occasion from his own YouTube channel. Trump later posted another link to the verbal exchange, this time to a recording on the video-sharing site Rumble.
While Trump has far more followers on X than on Truth Social (90 million vs. 7. 5 million), there are other considerations to keep in mind.
Trump owns a 60% stake in Trump Media
TMTG’s stock value also fell on Monday after Trump began posting on X, which could also be a draw on Trump, given that he will have to wait until Sept. 19, when a six-month lock-up period expires, before he can sell shares. . the inventories they maintain in the company.
Musk knows that keeping Trump satisfied and in his agfinisha could be the key to revitalizing X. But at the end of the day, Musk is still looking for himself: in Monday’s conversation, just after accepting Trump’s positions on electric cars and the United States. oil drilling that would appear to directly contradict Musk’s own business interests, Musk has proposed that, at an imaginable time, he play a role in Trump’s management as a component of a “government power agency. “
“I would love to,” Trump replied.
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