Elon Musk’s ‘election integrity neighborhood’ on X is stuffed with baseless claims

Whereas Elon Musk faces his personal election integrity questions offline, the X proprietor has deputized his followers to identify and report any “potential cases of voter fraud and irregularities”. The neighborhood he spawned is rife with unfounded claims handed off as proof of voter fraud.

Musk opted to not present as much as a required courtroom look Thursday in Philadelphia to answer a lawsuit difficult his political motion committee’s each day $1m voter giveaway. In the meantime, on-line, he has began a devoted neighborhood area on X, previously Twitter, the place he’s requested customers to share any points they see whereas voting. Customers posting on the self-contained feed, the “election integrity neighborhood”, rapidly started mentioning what they deemed as proof of fraud and election interference.

Tweets exhibiting every thing from ballots that arrived ripped, an ABC information system take a look at, a postal employee doing his job and dropping off mail-in ballots have been all introduced as proof that the upcoming presidential election had been compromised. Some customers posted movies of people they deemed suspicious, regardless of offering little or no proof of suspicious exercise and requested others in the neighborhood to assist determine them.

Among the many tweets are makes an attempt at doxxing and figuring out individuals who customers falsely accuse of poll field stuffing or stopping Trump supporters from voting. In a single case, a publish with 14,000 shares and 31,000 likes features a video of a postal employee bringing ballots right into a polling location in Northampton county, Pennsylvania.

The identical video had been shared all through X and different boards and retweeted by rightwing influencers like Alex Jones. The consumer asks for assist figuring out the person. “He says he’s with the publish workplace however idk if I purchase that,” the publish reads. “He wouldn’t speak to us and was performing very suspect.” The person in query was the performing postmaster and a 25-year-veteran of the US Postal Service, the Northampton county govt Lamont McClure confirmed to NBC Information. McClure advised NBC Information that the postal employee was already being harassed over the video.

Consultants say the neighborhood, which has greater than 50,000 members, follows the identical playbook utilized in feverish on-line boards after the 2020 election to gas claims that votes have been stolen. In 2020, it was the “Cease the Steal” Fb group, Telegram teams and message boards on alt-right social media agency Parler.

These teams amassed a whole lot of hundreds of followers who perpetuated the baseless declare that the election was being stolen from Donald Trump. A lot of the anecdotal and sometimes unfounded tales shared in these teams by people have been leveraged by rightwing influencers and different figures to create the narrative that the election was compromised, in accordance with a report by the Election Integrity Partnership.

“These are actual rumors by actual individuals which might be being picked up and utilized by a propaganda machine that basically needs to get that view on the market,” stated Renee DiResta, an affiliate professor at Georgetown College and former analysis supervisor at Stanford Web Observatory. “That’s what occurred in 2020. [It was the same] strategy of ‘cease the steal.’ The slogan got here from the highest nevertheless it was odd individuals who offered the ‘proof’ to again up the concept that the election was stolen.”

Earlier than anybody can decide whether or not the claims are true or false, customers seize on the posts and assume the customarily unsuspecting individual being proven are responsible or doing one thing unhealthy, stated DiResta. “Sadly the individuals who bear the prices are the random individuals whose images they take.”

The “election integrity neighborhood” supplies one other glimpse into the echo chamber of people throughout the nation who consider the election will probably be or has already been rigged towards Trump. Although the area is separate from the conventional X feed, Musk has additionally shared among the issues posted in the neighborhood on his personal web page.

Among the many narratives being pushed in the neighborhood is one which has turn out to be a pet conspiracy concept of Musk’s. The SpaceX CEO has loudly and sometimes made the false declare that the Biden administration was “importing voters” within the type of “unvetted unlawful immigrants”. In the previous couple of days, a Musk-funded tremendous Pac has been pushing a faux pro-Kamala Harris initiative referred to as Venture 2028. The initiative has posted faux pro-Harris adverts and despatched texts to voters that embrace claims that Harris will probably be opening the nation’s borders and is pushing for undocumented immigrants to have the ability to vote. Non-citizens aren’t allowed to vote within the US, and there may be no out there proof they’re voting in droves as claimed. Customers in the neighborhood are sharing movies they are saying supplies proof that Democrats are “bussing” undocumented immigrants to solid votes of their favor.