megulin bill Faux
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note echo escal amplify tucker, jnx, sucks from vdare swamp Gt replacement booster // tucker
caravan invasion hype fear
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gone a couple years now needed again for mass deport bs w groomer spin
mma Laura Ingraham calls Massachusetts “a hotbed of child predators”
02/13/25 homan
February 13, 2025, edition of Fox News' The Ingraham Angle
LAURA INGRAHAM (HOST): We have been hearing from our own Bill Melugin over the last, really, week or so, especially about these child predator illegals who have been picked up in liberal sanctuary state Massachusetts. We've seen it in other states, but for some reason Massachusetts, all of you watching out there, that little state of Massachusetts has become a hotbed of child predators. And, yet again, they're just continuing to stick by their sanctuary status. What do you say to the people of America tonight about those people who are holding onto sanctuary status?
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no lnx
LAT
Hollywood Inc.
From Orange County to the Texas border: How Bill Melugin became a Fox News fixture
Bill Melugin reporting for Fox News on the Rio Grande.
By Stephen Battaglio
Staff Writer
Feb. 1, 2023
Right before Fox News correspondent Bill Melugin goes on the air to deliver a live report — these days mostly from the southern border — he looks down for a moment and whispers.
While it might appear that he’s talking to a control room in New York, he says he’s summoning his late father for moral support.
“I’m just asking him to watch over me,” Melugin, 32, said in a recent interview. “ ‘Don’t let me mess up. Hope I’m making you proud.’ It’s a little conversation I have with him before every live shot.”
Whatever sustenance Melugin believes he is getting from the Great Beyond appears to be working. The Orange County native, who now lives in Brentwood, did 1,000 live shots from along the Rio Grande Valley last year and is a rising star at the conservative-leaning cable news channel.
A man wearing a blue short-sleeve shirt listens to a uniformed man talk near a river
Fox News correspondent Bill Melugin interviews a Border Patrol agent along the Rio Grande. (Fox News)
The follically gifted Melugin, who as a college student had a brief stint as a fashion model in Milan, could probably get a comfy anchor job in a temperature-controlled studio far from the Texas heat (he recently did some fill-in work out of the Fox News Washington studio). Instead, he is committed to covering a politically fraught issue that has generated wrath from Fox News critics over the years.
Using thermal-capable drones that can fly at night — and over federal land that can’t be entered on the ground — Melugin’s crew regularly provides dramatic footage of migrants crossing the border from Mexico.
He’s says he’s watched migrants drown as they cross the Rio Grande, children being sexually assaulted and illegal drugs being seized. Using conversational Spanish, his interviews with those who cross — most originating from Venezuela and Cuba — are brief, as they can no longer talk once they are apprehended by Border Patrol authorities. He recounts the painful stories of why they risked their lives to come to the U.S. Cameras also capture the movements of camouflaged figures crossing illegally at night.
Melugin’s persistence on the border, where he spent 170 days in 2022, is an irritant to the Biden White House, according to a Politico report. The publication quoted anonymous officials who described the coverage, which is often presented with the on-screen graphic “Biden’s Border Crisis,” as alarmist. U.S. Customs and Border Protection counted a record 2.4 million migrant encounters last year.
Jessica Tarlov (Rodrigo Cid / For The Times)
Hollywood Inc.
How Jessica Tarlov of ‘The Five’ became a liberal star on Fox News
Sept. 29, 2022
Jay Wallace, the Fox News executive who oversees the network’s coverage, said he’s never gotten a specific complaint from the administration about Melugin’s reporting.
Where Fox News has gotten major blowback is how its commentators have weaponized the immigration issue to rile up the MAGA followers in the network’s audience.
Last year, host Tucker Carlson said the Democratic Party’s border policy is aimed at “trying to replace the current electorate” in the U.S. with “new people, more obedient voters from the Third World.” The calamitous tone on the topic has persisted for a while. In 2018, Carlson has said mass immigration made the country “poorer and dirtier and more divided.”
But the opinion hosts do not try to draw Melugin into debates or commentary on the issue when he appears on their Fox News shows. He’s turned down offers to appear on public forums about immigration. He accepts that Carlson and other opinion hosts riffing off his reports is standard operating procedure at Fox News.
“I’ve seen our footage spun on both sides of the aisle,” Melugin said. “You’ll sometimes have people on the right wing using the footage to say there’s an invasion on the border. I’ve seen our same footage used by people on the left to say ‘We’re being so cruel to these migrants. This country is showing no humanity.’ All we’re doing is putting a mirror up and showing what’s happening. People are going to use it for their representative political commentary and that’s fine.”
Gabriel Kahn, a journalism professor at USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, said Melugin is not in an enviable position in having to navigate inflammatory Fox News commentary. But he believes reporters need to be more vigilant in how their work is used in an era when the line between straight news and commentary can be blurry.
“If he sees that his reporting is being manipulated on his own network in a way that doesn’t represent the facts as he sees them accurately, he has a responsibility to correct that record no matter how uncomfortable that might make him,” Kahn said. “The truth is that in the current media environment, it’s not enough just to report facts as you see them; you also need to be the guardian of your own reporting.”
Melugin countered that he will go on shows such as “Tucker Carlson Tonight” so he can control the way his stories are told. “I am willing to report for any show, anytime, anyplace, because if my reporting is going to be used, then who better to make sure it’s done right, and done accurately, than me?” he said.
The narrative of the country’s handling of the border has been an ongoing challenge for the federal government.
Jeh Johnson, who served as director of Homeland Security in the Obama administration, recalled a 2014 poll that showed 54% of the public believed there was an immigration crisis, even though border crossings were at a 20-year low. He said he had to court conservative media to counter the perception the dramatic images on the border can create.
Johnson is among the immigration experts who are concerned that news coverage does not focus enough on the causes that are driving people from countries with authoritarian regimes to risk their lives coming over.
“There’s not enough imagery of what life is like for these families in Central America, which is causing them to flee in the first place,” Johnson said. “People need to understand that so long as the push factors exist ... there’s no level of border security that you could throw up that will prevent people from making the basic decision to flee a burning building.”
Wallace maintained his network has addressed reasons for the surge at the border, but said the network’s focus on how the U.S. deals with migrants when they arrive is legitimate.
“We’ve tried to go down to show some of these routes in the past and the tough road that they have, but at the end of the day it is up to the United States to come up with a policy to manage this,” he said.
Melugin is well aware Fox News has its detractors. But he asserts that the locals in border towns such as El Paso and Eagle Pass appreciate the network’s presence there, as other outlets were rarely seen before governors took the highly controversial decision to start shipping migrants out to New York, Martha’s Vineyard and other politically blue areas.
“The Rio Grande Valley is traditionally a very Democratic area,” he said. “We’ve had locals come up to us, shake our hands and say ‘You know, we don’t watch Fox’ but they shake our hands and say, ‘Thank you guys for being out here to cover this.’”
Melugin is clearly well-sourced in the border enforcement community as well. Last July, he reported on leaked audio of DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas telling Border Patrol agents during a private meeting in McAllen, Texas, that “we’re losing” and the border situation is “unsustainable.”
Fox News correspondent Bill Melugin during his time at KTTV in Los Angeles. (Fox News)
A graduate of Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University, Melugin covered the border in his first TV job at a station in El Paso in 2013 and quickly worked his way to KTTV, the Fox-owned station in Los Angeles.
Melugin quickly got on the radar of Fox News executives who wanted him to come east to join the network. He turned them down but said he would be interested if they had an opening in his hometown. He joined Fox News in May 2021.
Melugin’s desire to be in Los Angeles stems from the sudden death of his father, Gary, a West Coast manager for insurance company AIG, who suffered a pulmonary embolism at age 55. He is still emotionally raw over the loss that changed his approach to life and his family.
“I considered myself an immature little boy who really didn’t know anything about life and took a lot of things for granted,” Melugin said. “It made me grow up very quickly.”
Melugin said his father constantly encouraged him to have a strong work ethic. KTTV anchor Elex Michaelson, a friend and former co-worker, saw him act on it close-up when he arrived at the station in 2017.
“He was still pretty green, and they kind of took a chance on him,” Michaelson said. “He was not originally hired as an investigative reporter at our station but was just so passionate about it that on weekends, after work and before work, he’s poring through documents and looking at all these different stories on his own time in almost an obsessive way that I have not seen any of my colleagues do at any of the stations that I worked.”
Melugin was part of the KTTV team that uncovered exclusive pictures of California Gov. Gavin Newsom dining at French Laundry without a mask at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.
Melugin won an Edward R. Murrow Award in 2021 for a gritty report on meth addiction in the homeless community, perpetuated by Mexico’s Jalisco New Generation Cartel.
Melugin’s mother, Audrey, was proud but a little anxious over the reports that have propelled her son’s career. “He’s had to kind of toughen himself up a little bit because of some of the things he sees,” she said. “He has a soft heart.”
Audrey Melugin would have never predicted her son would become a regular presence on TV. As a shy kid growing up in Aliso Viejo, he wanted to be a writer.
“If someone had told me, even when he was in high school, he’d be doing what he’s doing now I would have bet the house it wasn’t going to happen” she said.
Always an animal lover, Melugin and his Fox News crew have tried to help place abandoned pets that turn up along the Rio Grande. Audrey Melugin has two dogs from the litter of one of the animals they looked after, and a cat recovered during her son’s time working in El Paso.
She is thankful her son has chosen to remain close to Orange County, where she still resides (Michaelson describes his pal as a “mama’s boy”). But she is also aware his career is on the ascent.
“I’ve always told him if you have a better opportunity do it, but he is very protective of me,” she said. “I appreciate it. But I don’t want to be the one to hold him back either.”
More to Read
DELANO, CALIF. JANUARY 9, 2025 - Yesenia Acosta leans in to get advice from an attorney during a public meeting to provide information about constitutional rights for immigrants by a consortium of legal counsel, attorneys, organizations, and community experts at the Robert F. Kennedy High School Auditorium in Delano. (Tomas Ovalle / For The Times)
Community groups set up strike teams to respond to Trump’s mass deportation plans
Jan. 25, 2025
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no lnx twt
https://www.mediamatters.org/vdare/white-nationalists-embrace-fox-news-bill-melugin
White nationalists embrace Fox News’ Bill Melugin
The network’s top reporter at the US southern border has been promoted and celebrated by anti-immigrant racists
WRITTEN BY JOHN KNEFEL
PUBLISHED 12/20/22
White nationalists and other far-right extremists have embraced and celebrated Fox News’ Bill Melugin, the network’s primary correspondent at the US southern border. His reporting is regularly mentioned and praised on racist, anti-immigrant websites including VDARE, Infowars, and other extremist outlets, highlighting the ideological overlap between so-called mainstream conservatism and its more openly racist fringes.
Melugin is a fixture on Fox News, regularly appearing both in supposed straight news programming and during primetime opinion shows. He has been on Fox at least 427 times in 2022, including at least 30 segments on the network’s flagship program, Tucker Carlson Tonight. (Data on Melugin's appearances is current through December 19, 2022, at 12:40pm.)
Drawing clear distinctions between mainstream conservatism and white nationalist extremism is not easy. Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, for example, has fully embraced the racist “great replacement” conspiracy theory, once a fringe position only pushed by overt racists. Melugin has played a key role in much of Carlson’s mainstreaming of that xenophobic idea, so it is not a surprise that his coverage would also appear in far-right media venues.
Bill Melugin / Tucker Carlson / caravan
CitationFox News
One of the racist sites that has embraced Melugin is VDare, a white nationalist outlet founded by Peter Brimelow,a reclusive conservative publisher who straddles the line between the conservative establishment and overt white supremacy. Brimelow endorsed “racial nationalism” at CPAC in 2018, and one year later argued that when it came to immigration policy, “Western elites” were only interested in “repressing the white host nations,” according to the Southern Poverty Law Center. In a column for VDare in 2012, white nationalist John Derbyshire argued that, “White supremacy, in the sense of a society in which key decisions are made by white Europeans, is one of the better arrangements History has come up with,” also as reported by the SPLC.
Brimelow recently attended the New York Young Republican Club’s annual gala in Manhattan.He was photographed next to former Trump adviser Steve Bannon, host of the War Room podcast, further illustrating the porous boundaries between supposedly respectable conservatism and its explicitly racist fellow travelers.
Over the last year and a half, VDare has used Melugin’s reporting as the basis for at least 31 blogs or videos on their site. While it’s true that an individual reporter can’t control what happens to their journalism once it’s out in the world, the pattern that emerges from VDare’s commentary on, and aggregation of, Melugin’s work is clear. The stories Melugin tells, and the way he frames them, fully align with VDare’s white nationalist agenda.
VDare celebrates Melugin’s reporting
On December 12, conservativeedgelordand Twitter owner Elon Musk approvingly responded to a typically sensationalistic tweet from Melugin. “Wow,” Musk replied to a video purporting to show over 1,000 migrants crossing the Rio Grande river without authorization. Musk’s interaction with Melugin’s post amplified its reach significantly. Later that morning, VDare’s official twitter account retweeted Melugin’s original tweet, again signaling the close proximity between conservative provocateurs like Musk and more overtly racist outlets.
BREAKING: A huge migrant caravan of over 1,000 people crossed illegally into El Paso, TX last night, making it the largest single group we have ever seen. The city of El Paso reports Border Patrol now has over 5,000 in custody & has released hundreds to city streets.
CitationFrom the Twitter account of VDare, posted December 12.
VDare’s account promoted Melugin two other times that morning as well, in both cases by retweeting comments added by white nationalist and Infowars contributor Dan Lyman. The account also retweeted Melugin or amplified his work at least nine other times in December, including one instance in which white nationalist and former Trump advisor Stephen Miller used his footage to argue against a spending bill Congress was debating. And in August, VDare celebrated after Musk had responded positively to another Melguin tweet.
Looks like a scene out of World War Z or Elysium The US as we’ve known it is finished. Just a matter of how / when it dies and what comes next.
CitationFrom the Twitter account of VDare.
Not a serious country anymore
CitationFrom the Twitter account of VDare
He's noticed!-- @elonmusk on @BillFOXLA 's daily reports on the Biden Rush at the southern border. #IMPEACHBIDENHARRIS
CitationFrom the Twitter account of VDare
VDare amplifies Melugin’s work even more frequently on their website. In October, VDare published a story based on a tweet of Melugin’s that incorrectly reported a Border Patrol agent had shot and killed a detained migrant after he had gone for the agent’s gun. In fact, as an FBI investigation found just days later, the man, Manuel Gonzalez-Moran, had apparently grabbed an unspecified “edged weapon” off an office desk, after which point a Border Patrol agent shot and killed him.
In July, VDare published a story under the same byline praising Melugin as an “intrepid” reporter “who documents The Great Replacement almost daily on his Twitter feed.” The same credited writer used similar language in February, again referencing “Fox News’s intrepid Bill Melugin, who keeps an eagle eye of Biden’s planned invasion of replacement citizens.” Also in February, a post under a pseudonymous byline said Melugin “has been doing excellent coverage along the border.”
Both Melugin and VDare have repeatedly covered the controversy over a photo that initially appeared to show Border Patrol agents whipping a Haitian migrant named Mirard Joseph in September 2021. Melugin has consistently claimed that Border Patrol didn’t do anything wrong. In October, he revisited the allegations, tweeting out an email obtained by conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation sent to Department of Homeland Security head Alejandro Mayorkas that quoted the photojournalist who took the shot. The email appeared to undercut the whipping allegations, and cast Mayorkas in an unfavorable light. VDare embedded Melugin's tweet in a blog that also included criticism of Mayorkas from the Border Patrol Union and Texas Senator Ted Cruz.
The stories Melugin tells, and the way he frames them, fully align with VDare’s white nationalist agenda.
The reality of the story is far more nuanced than either Melugin or VDare want to admit. Melugin’s supposed smoking gun email included a write-up of an interview of Paul Ratje, the photographer, in which said he hadn't witnessed agents whipping any migrants, but later said his comments had been misconstrued as giving Border Patrol “a pass.” Joseph and other migrants mistreated by Border Patrol agents that day filed a lawsuit against the government, claiming agents had “lashed” him. Joseph described his treatment while in U.S. custody as “the worst humiliation I have endured in my life.” An official investigation by Customs and Border Protection didn’t find evidence that whipping took place, but did uncover “unprofessional and dangerous behavior by several individual Agents.” But both Melugin and VDare saw an opportunity to demonize migrants and took it.
Conspiracy theorists at Infowars rely on Melugin's work
Melugin’s support from Infowars extends beyond the recent tweets from Lyman, the white nationalist who VDare retweeted. In September, Alex Jones’ co-host Owen Shroyer repeatedly praised Melugin after Politico reported that the Biden White House had “become increasingly irritated” with the Fox News correspondent. Shroyer claimed, without evidence, that the story was an attempt to “get Melugin shut down and banned and censored from the Internet” to punish him for his journalism.
Video CitationFrom the September 21, 2022, edition of Infowars'The Alex Jones Show, streamed on Rumble
“Now, who’s down there reporting at the border, probably more-so and better than anyone else, that’s Bill Melugin,” Shroyer said to introduce the topic. (Shroyer, never one to sweat the details, pronounced Melugin’s name wrong until a producer appeared to correct him midway through the segment.)
“And so why are they mad at Bill Melugin?” Shroyer asked. “Because he’s down at the border every day with a Fox News crew, with cameras, and they’re showing the tens of thousands of illegal immigrants that come across the border every day. And talking to Border Patrol about the terrorists, and the child rapists that they arrest.”
Like VDare, the Infowars website regularly writes articles based on Melugin’s work. A review of Infowars’ archives show at least 37 posts that include his reporting, typically as the piece’s primary or exclusive source. These stories adopt his anti-migrant framing, treating irregular border crossings as a rolling catastrophe – the frontline in a war zone – that must be addressed with militarized responses.
In many cases, Melugin is mentioned without additional comment, but there are several instances in which Infowars bloggers express their admiration for him. Writer Steve Watson recently celebrated Melugin as a reporter “who has been at the front lines on the border crisis for years now.” Last month, on the day of the 2022 midterms, Lyman characterized Melugin as “documenting the invasion of Maverick County,” in Texas. One month earlier, writer Kelen McBreen praised a tweet of Melugin’s that supposedly “accurately pointed out” the hypocrisy of New York city’s immigration policy compared with Texas’. Watson, weeks earlier, again cheered on Melugin for being “ever present at the border.”
Racists, other far-right extremists praise Melugin’s Del Rio bridge story
Arguably Melugin’s breakthrough story came in August and September, 2021, when he covered an influx of mostly Haitian migrants who had sought refuge under the Del Rio bridge in Texas. Infowars covered the issue by cross-posting a blog from far-right conspiracy site ZeroHedge, written by pseudonymous blogger Tyler Durden. “Melugin has been reporting from the bridge for more than a month,” Durden wrote approvingly that September, also referring to the “stunning drone footage” Melugin had captured.
When the FAA issued a two-week flight restriction over the bridge, Durden accused the Biden administration of trying to kill the story, and praised Melugin for persevering. “The Biden administration’s attempt to cover up the border disaster by blocking drones didn’t stop Melugin and his team who hitched a ride on a Texas Department of Public Safety’s helicopter to capture an aerial view of the migrant crisis,” Durden gushed. In fact, shortly after issuing the restriction, the FAA provided clearance for Melugin about a day later.
The Del Rio bridge story became a national sensation, with Melugin’s implicitly xenophobic coverage leading the way. The story spread to some of the worst parts of the Internet, where the implicit bigotry was abandoned for explicit racism. Neo-Nazi site The Daily Stormer referred to the migrants as “invaders,” claiming the United States’ refugee policy was “about making America nonwhite. There’s no other goal.”
The racist site Occidental Dissentalso covered the story. It was “another scene of imperial decline,” according to the site’s founder, Brad Griffin, who uses the pen name Hunter Wallace. “This has been going on ever since Joe Biden was inaugurated in January,” he added. “The only difference now is seeing so many black faces joining the flood.”
What’s most notable about this explicitly racist commentary is how closely it matched Fox News’ own coverage at the time. As Media Matters and others noted, Tucker Carlson – using Melugin’s reporting – fully embraced the racist great replacement conspiracy theorywhile discussing the Del Rio bridge story. Biden’s immigration policy was designed "to change the racial mix of the country,” Carlson said. “In political terms, this policy is called ‘the great replacement,’ the replacement of legacy Americans with more obedient people from far-away countries.”
Melugin frames himself as a straightforward reporter, just covering the facts as he sees them. But his body of work has been wholeheartedly embraced by far-right extremists and conspiracy theorists, Carlson very much among them. That’s not intrepid reporting – it’s laying the foundation for racist propaganda.
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https://www.mediamatters.org/twitter/elon-musk-continues-cater-far-right-twitter-accounts-promoting-bigotry-extremism-and
no lnx many twts
elon Musk continues to cater to far-right Twitter accounts promoting bigotry, extremism, and misinformation
WRITTEN BY CHARIS HOARD, AUDREY MCCABE & RUBY SEAVEY
PUBLISHED 12/15/22
Twitter’s new CEO Elon Musk has spent the first month and a half of his tenure catering to the far-right by reinstating and interacting with right-wing figures responsible for spreading bigotry and misinformation. Musk engaged with these types of accounts at least 170 times between October 27 and December 13, according to a Media Matters review.
Since gaining control of the platform on October 27, Musk has advanced his vision of Twitter becoming the “digital town square” by unilaterally reinstating over a dozen high-profile right-wing accounts and granting other previously suspended accounts that had spread misinformation “amnesty.”
A month and a half of Musk at the helm of Twitter has also helped conspiracy theorists and toxic posters spread hateful or dangerous rhetoric. Musk himself has even used the platform to amplify multiple conspiracy theories and has employed common QAnon tactics like baselessly accusing a former Twitter executive of promoting pedophilia. Most recently, he tweeted a common QAnon phrase that has given QAnon figures a reason to believe that Musk potentially supports the conspiracy theory.
Media Matters previously found that Musk catered to the far-right by interacting with accounts known to push misinformation and bigotry at least 24 times in the first days of owning Twitter. In an updated review, Media Matters has found that Musk has continued to entertain these types of accounts, engaging with them at least 170 times between October 27 and December 13.
From decrying “wokeism” to sharing right-wing talking points about U.S. immigration policy, below are some examples of Musk interacting with known bad actors.
Musk criticized COVID-19 mitigation efforts and praised an anti-vaccine misinformer
Musk expressed support and admiration for anti-vaccine figure Dr. Jay Bhattacharya and his work. In a four-part thread, Bhattacharya praised Musk for “promis[ing] access to help find out” why he was placed “on the blacklist on the first day” he joined Twitter, in August 2021. Musk responded, “Thank you for your rigorous adherence to science.”
In a thread mocking people concerned about COVID-19, Musk interacted with right-wing troll account Catturd and implicitly criticized pandemic lockdowns.
Musk and Catturd mocking COVID mitigation efforts
Musk decried “wokeism,” pushed conspiracy theories, andcriticized “the culture war” when interacting with right-wing accounts
After Musk tweeted an emoji of a bunny, an explicit nod to QAnon and far-right communities, he tweeted “Lmaooo” at a response from conservative stand-up comedians the “Hodgetwins” mocking a concerned response. Right-wing personality Alex Lorusso – known as ALX – joined in and left a similarly sarcastic tweet, to which Musk responded, “Bunny emojis are hate speech!!”
Musk responding to the Hodetwins and ALX on Twitter making fun of people concerned that Musk tweeted a QAnon reference
Musk agreed with the Hodgetwins and another user calling for people to “speak out” against wokeism. Musk tweeted, “The woke mind virus is either defeated or nothing else matters,” to which the Hodgetwins commented, “Our future depends on more and more people waking up and speaking out on what’s happening to society. Stop being silent!” Another user added that public figures need to “take an open stand against wokism,” and Musk responded with “Yes.”
Musk expressed support for far-right commentator Ian Miles Cheong’s comment alleging that the media is suppressing “criticism of wokeness.” Musk originally asked, “What do you think of the culture war?” and agreed with Cheong’s response: “A single ideology dominates and silences the rest, branding everything it disapproves of as ‘violence’ and a ‘threat to democracy.’ Criticism of wokeness is ‘stochastic terrorism.’ Only one narrative is allowed to prevail and it is promoted by the media. All dissent is quashed.”
After Musk tweeted a video of shirts saying “#StayWoke” that were found in a closet at Twitter’s headquarters, he agreed with comments made by right-wing figures who mocked or criticized the Black Lives Matter movement. Cheong responded to this thread, “Black Lives Matter (now exposed as a scam, they bought millions of dollars in property and never gave back to the community) was built on a lie,” to which Musk said, “Troublesome.”
Right-wing podcast host Chase Geiser also responded to Musk’s initial video, saying, “You officially bought the world’s largest collection of #StayWoke merch.” Musk responded back to Geiser with two laughing emojis and “worth it.”
Far-right grifter Andy Ngo joined in on the thread, saying, “‘Hands up, don’t shoot’ is one of the biggest hoaxes to come from the American left in the last decade. That big lie has inspired many to become radicalized and militant.” Musk responded, “True.”
Engaging with right-wing accounts, Musk amplified attacks against former Twitter employees and commented on alleged content moderation decision from before his tenure
Musk agreed with election denier Dinesh D’Souza's baseless claim that Twitter before Musk’s leadership banned only conservative accounts. Musk told D’Souza he was “correct” after he tweeted, “We don’t hear much about Democrats and leftists being let back on Twitter. Why? Because they were never kicked off in the first place. Their lies and misinformation simply escaped all scrutiny. Censorship has been deployed as a one-way operation against conservatives.”
In a thread initiated by Tim Young, contributor for far-right nationalist outlet American Greatness, Musk provided context to his decision to reinstate former President Donald Trump’s account. Young tweeted that “the left can’t handle” Trump being back on Twitter. Musk responded to this tweet by saying the reinstatement was intended to “correct a grave mistake in banning his account” and sharing that he “reluctantly” voted for Biden over Trump. In the same thread, a MAGA account asked Musk if he would “support Ron DeSantis in 2024.” Musk said, “Yes,” before noting that “Twitter as a platform must be fair to all.”
Musk compounded the viral hate account Libs of TikTok's attack against a former Twitter employee.Libs of TikTok posted screenshots of a former Twitter employee’s tweets criticizing Musk for laying off Twitter’s infrastructure team. Musk responded to the tweet, saying, “A tragic case of adult onset Tourette’s.”
Musk interacted with white nationalist Paul Ramsey and Andy Ngo in a thread about Antifa accounts on Twitter.Ramsey tweeted, “Twitter is reportedly nuking pedo accounts. This is eliminating much of Antifa Twitter.” In response, Musk expressed his dedication to “removing child exploitation.” In the same thread, Musk responded twice to Ngo after Ngo claimed Antifa uses Twitter to organize violence.
Musk amplified QAnon-spouting conspiracy theorist and Fox News contributor Lara Logan's attack against former Twitter Trust and Safety Council member Anne Collier.
Musk responded to Lara Logan tweet agreeing that Anne Collier should be held accountable
Musk interjected in Twitter threads about U.S. political issues initiated by right-wing accounts
Musk interacted with Fox News reporter Bill Melugin, who reports on and promotes fearmongering around southern border immigration. Melugin tweeted about a migrant caravan passing through El Paso, Texas, claiming it was “the largest single group we have ever seen,” to which Musk responded, “Wow.”
Musk responded to Melugin andprovocateur Kim Dotcom about people crossing the U.S. southern border. After Melugin tweeted a video of migrants crossing the southern border allegedly without authorization, Musk responded twice, saying, “Seems bizarre that it’s so easy enter illegally, but so hard to get a legal work visa.” After Kim Dotcom joined the conversation, sharing an article about “Dems voter farming strategy,” Musk responded, “Behavior follows the incentives for political power.”
Musk interacted with right-wing satirical outlet The Babylon Bee’s account multiple times, once about Hunter Biden and another about the 2022 midterm elections. Both times he agreed with the right-wing outlet and commented with laughing emojis.
Musk responded to a tweet from failed Arizona gubernatorial candidate Kari Lake even though it contained election misinformation. Lake asked Musk why Twitter was “still suppressing election criticism & news,” along with a screenshot of a right-wing reporter’s baseless claims of election fraud. Musk said, “Reasonable criticism of elections and judicial challenges are, of course, lawful. That seems to be the case here. Clear incitement to violence will result in suspension and significant deception should result in a @CommunityNotes correction.”
Musk responding to kari Lake tweet containing election misinformation
Musk agreed with right-wing attacks on mainstream media
Musk expressed support for Ian Miles Cheong's belief that mainstream media outlets are actively upset about Twitter’s new direction under Musk’s leadership. Musk agreed with Cheong's claims that the “establishment media is angry” because Twitter no longer controls “the establishment and its activist allies,” and because the public “can now openly question the narrative."
Musk agreed with Tim Young that CBS – and the mainstream media more generally – is biased.Young called CBS biased for briefly not engaging on Twitter, to which Musk said, “So you say ‘mainstream media’ is biased? Hmm, will have to fact-check that with mainstream media. Nope, they say everything is cool!”
Musk agreed with Breitbart alum Raheem J. Kassam’s claim that mainstream media are intent on “destroying” Twitter. Kassam tweeted that mainstream media is engaging in a “co-ordinated attempt to destroy Twitter,” and Musk responded, “They just can’t stop writing about Twitter, which is driving usage through roof lmao.”
Musk and Cheong exchanged similar views on supposed censorship by the mainstream media. On November 11, Musk tweeted, “As Twitter pursues the goal of elevating citizen journalism, media elite will try everything to stop that from happening.” Cheong replied, “The media elite wants a monopoly on the truth, and citizen journalism threatens their narrative. Can’t have that, so they bully corporations and social media companies into doing their censoring for them by calling it all ‘disinformation.’” Musk replied, “True.”
Musk interacted with right-wing accounts that praised the publication of the Twitter Files
Musk agreed with the Hodgetwins’ baseless claim that the media covered up the Twitter files. After part of the Twitter Files were published, the Hodgetwins claimed the “media is silent” about “one of the biggest political scandals in modern American history” because “the damn media was in on the scandal.” Musk responded with a bullseye emoji.
Musk interacted with Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton multiple times about the Twitter files. Musk agreed with Fitton that the Twitter Files provided “damning evidence” that the platform censored Trump leading up to the 2020 election and said more information was “coming soon” about Twitter’s treatment of former President Donald Trump.
Musk amplified attacks launched against former Twitter executive Yoel Rothby right-wing commentator Glenn Greenwald. In response to a tweet revealing information about how Twitter chose to label information about the 2020 election, Greenwald attacked Roth and “his little censorship minions,” claiming they turned Twitter into a “full-on Democratic Party activist machine” to interfere in the 2020 presidential election. Musk agreed, saying “...there is no question that Twitter operated as a Democratic Party activist machine.”
Musk endorsed ALX’s opinion that the public is entitled to know how Twitter made previous content moderation decisions.
Musk saying Twitter files are needed to "restore public trust"responding to a tweet from ALX