What Elon Musk-related news has the Media Research Center hidden from its readers lately?
- A Musk tweet promoting the idea of massive election fraud in Arizona was brutally fact-checked as “extremely false” by an Arizona election official (who happens to be a Republican).
- A far-right Twitter/X account Musk has previously championed viciously smeared the (black) mayor of Baltimore as a “DEI mayor” in the aftermath of the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse, despite offering no evidence that the collapse had anything to do with the mayor or DEI. Many called out this racist attack.
- Musk decided to give “premium” blue-check status and related privileges — normally $8 a month — for free to any Twitter/X who was deemed “influential members of the community,” a move that was widely viewed as a surrender from his attempt to turn the blue check into a moneymaker and a certain desperation on Musk’s part to keep users on the site.
- Musk will make new Twitter/X users pay for each post they make, as much as $1, purportedly to stop the spread of bots on the platform.
- And there are dozens of paid and verified Twitter/X accounts spreading neo-Nazi content.
Instead of reporting these news events to its readers, the MRC instead focused on happenings in Brazil, since doing so adheres to its Musk-fluffing agenda. Luis Cornelio was the designated fluffer in an April 8 post:
The battle between an infamous left-wing Brazilian judge and X owner Elon Musk has taken yet another dark twist that could put Brazil an inch closer to becoming a totalitarian regime, critics warn.
On Sunday, Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes launched a criminal investigation into Musk after the tech mogul dared to defy a contentious court order demanding what has been described as the unwarranted censorship of some X users.
X’s Global Government Affairs announced that de Moraes ordered the social media platform to ban certain popular users over so-called disinformation. Tellingly, the judge ordered the platform to not disclose the order.
In response, Musk ordered the platform to unban these accounts, arguing that de Moraes has no legal basis for the requested censorship. Such a defiant act seemingly triggered de Moraes to launch a probe into Musk for potential obstruction of justice, criminal organization and incitement of crime, Forbes reported on Monday.
Journalist Michael Shellenberger, an individual who often breaks stories out of Brazil, tweeted on Monday that the criminal probe into Musk may lead to the closure of X’s operations in the Central American country.
Cornelio offered no facts to back up any of his assertions — that the investigation into Trump is politically motivated or that the disinformation being removed from Twitter in Brazil is “so-called” or “censorship” — he’s just repeating the narratives he’s being paid to repeat, which is more important to his employer than telling the full truth. And, of course, he’s hiding the full truth about what’s happening, as a more credible media outlet reported:
Neither Brazilian courts nor X have disclosed the list of accounts that have been ordered to stop publishing, but prominent supporters of former President Jair Bolsonaro and far-right activists no longer appear on the platform.
Some belong to a network known as “digital militias.” They were targeted by a five-year investigation overseen by de Moraes, initially for allegedly spreading defamatory fake news and threats against Supreme Court justices, and then after Bolsonaro’s 2022 loss for inciting demonstrations across the country that were pushing to overturn President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva’s election.
[…]Whether investigating former President Jair Bolsonaro, banishing his far-right allies from social media, or ordering the arrest of supporters who stormed government buildings on Jan. 8, 2023, Moraes has aggressively pursued those he views as undermining Brazil’s young democracy.
Days after a mob stormed Brazil’s capital, de Moraes ordered Facebook, Twitter, Telegram, TikTok and Instagram to block the accounts of individuals accused of inciting or supporting attacks on Brazilian democratic order.
In other words, this is a case where Musk (along with Cornelio) is once again siding with right-wing interests who seek power and the undermining of democracy. Not a good look for either of them.
Cornelio added an update that perpetuated that Musk-fluffing framing:
On Monday, MRC Free Speech America reached out to the Brazilian Superior Electoral Court for comment on Elon Musk’s remarks against de Moraes, but a spokesperson did not respond. Instead, the spokesperson directed MRC to Moraes’s criminal referral to the attorney general, asking them to investigate Musk’s pro-free speech actions pertaining to the previous orders. You can find the referral (in Portuguese) here.
As we know from his lawsuits against those who tell the truth about him, Musk is anything but “pro-free speech” — not that Cornelio will ever admit that.
But when Musk ultimately decided to conform to the Brazilian court rulings, Cornelio effectively portrayed Musk as a traitor to the right-wing cause in an April 18 post:
Tech mogul Elon Musk has folded in his so-called defense of free speech in his recent battle with a Brazilian court.
On Monday, Musk’s attorneys informed Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes that social media platform X (formerly known as Twitter) will comply with all of the censorship demands targeting accounts accused of spreading misinformation, according to Reuters.
“As already communicated to the federal police, X Brasil informs that all orders issued by this Supreme Court and the Superior Electoral Court will continue to be fully complied with by X Corp,” Musk’s legal counsel reportedly wrote in the letter addressed to Moraes.
Musk’s compliance marks a stark departure from his vehement threats to ignore the orders. “We are lifting all restrictions,” Musk declared on April 6, accusing the Moraes of threatening X with fines and imprisonment. “As a result, we will probably lose all revenue in Brazil and have to shut down our office there. But principles matter more than profit.”
The battle between X and de Moraes stems from an inquiry by Brazil’s Superior Electoral Court that centers on the spread of what the government deemed to be misinformation amid federal elections. In court rulings, Moraes accused X of allowing some popular Brazil-based users to spread so-called misinformation. In turn, he demanded Musk censor them.
In court decisions, Moraes accused X of being a major driver of alleged misinformation and demanded Musk censor these users. Amid Musk’s initial refusal to comply with such demands, Moraes threatened to impose daily fines of $20,000 for each account not banned.
Note that Cornelio again refused to acknowledge that the misinformation being targeted actually was misinformation, using qualifiers like “so-called misinformation” and “what the government deemed to be misinformation.” Again, Cornelio offered no evidence whatsoever that the things being targeted were not misinformation — another desperate attempt to cling to his predetermined narrative.
Meanwhile, P.J. Gladnick spent an April 21 post ranting that a Washington Post article defended the judge:
Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes is enraged that X (which will forever still be known as Twitter) allows the free flow of information because he labels some of it “disinformation” which he cannot tolerate. Therefore de Moraes has demanded that Twitter remove a number of accounts.
In the old obedient days of Twitter when the management treated “disinformation” (which is mostly information contrary to liberal views) to be one of the great sins of our world, they would have immediately acceded to the request. However the new owner, Elon Musk, refused to take down the accounts which should make him a free speech hero. But in Friday’s paper, but to the Washington Post found the real hero in this matter is the authoritarian Brazilian Supreme Court Justice.
When a researcher with the Atlantic Council pointed out how Musk’s policies support far-right movements, Gladnick played whataboutism by playing the George Soros card:
The Post failed to note that the leftwing Atlantic Council is a think tank funded by George Soros which hyped the idea for the Biden Department of Homeland Security’s Disinformation Governance Board. Ironic since by their rules, the failure to mention this could be considered… disinformation. See how that works?
Well, no, that’s not how that works at all. We recall that the MRC spent a lot of time trying to destroy the proposed Disinformation Governance Board with lies and smears — which it ultimately succeeded in doing — because it didn’t want right-wing disinformation to be called out (seemingly an admission that right-wing activists rely on misinformation to spread their narratives).
Like Cornelio, Gladnick refused to concede that any of the misinformation targeted by the judge really was misinformation, though he offered no evidence that it wasn’t.