The news didn’t make a big splash because it seemed so obvious: Elon Musk supports Republican Donald Trump in his race for the White House. The Tesla boss made it official on his own social network, X, amid the emotion sparked by the assassination attempt against the former American president during a campaign rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Then he immediately took a more conspiratorial tone, implying “deliberate” inaction by the secret services responsible for security, even if they were not “extremely incompetent”. A message viewed more than 80 million times, which can be explained by the popularity of Musk himself, the most followed account on the platform with nearly 190 million subscribers.
X, formerly known as Twitter, is more than ever at the center of conspiracy theories that have been going around since Saturday. Unsurprisingly, the most common one depicts the real estate tycoon as the victim of a plot that is as sordid as it is mysterious.They “let Trump be shot,” claimed former masculinist kickboxer Andrew Tate, which has so far garnered nearly 13 million impressions. The Shadow of Ezra account, with nearly 400,000 subscribers, claimed that the deep state [l’État profond, NDLR] attempted to assassinate Donald Trump live on television”. The latter also presents a list of sponsors “in collusion” with the CIA, the executor, such as Alexander Soros [le fils de George, NDLR]Barack Obama and even Trump’s former vice president, Mike Pence. Alex Jones, a very famous radio host in the American conspiracy sphere, also targeted the very recurrent deep state in a live stream watched by hundreds of thousands of people. “Conspiracy theories, particularly in the QAnon movement, predicted that people would one day attempt to kill Donald Trump. Obviously, these theories are now taking on their full force,” explains Thomas Huchon, a journalist and founder of the media outlet antifakenews.ai, which specializes in issues related to online disinformation and conspiracy theories.
On the other hand, and this is more recent, one of the most popular words on X in the last few hours has been the word staged for “staging”, supposedly, therefore, by the Trump camp. The Washington Post evokes the action of “BlueAnon”, blue as Democrat, in opposition to the pro-Republican QAnon nebula sporting red on its “MAGA” caps (Make America Great Again). The “BlueAnon” Lakota Man, some 500,000 followers, sees “fake blood” on Trump’s injured ear. A scene “too perfect” according to him. The war of “narratives” is raging between the two camps. It should, without a doubt, continue until the presidential election in November. Particularly on X.
Support for the “QAnon Shaman”
This influx of conspiratorial remarks on the platform will not surprise anyone. It seemed inevitable, in reaction to what is the first attempted assassination of an American president or ex-president in the era of social networks, noted the American press. The photo of Donald Trump, his fist clenched in the middle of his security agents, took only a few minutes to go around the planet. X is known for its reactivity to so-called hot news. “There is also a strong pre-existing imagination in the United States around an event of the same type, the assassination of Democratic President John Fitzgerald Kennedy, in 1963,” says Tristan Mendès France, teacher, expert in social networks and conspiracy movements. “According to a recent surveySix in 10 Americans still believe that Lee Harvey Oswald [le tireur avéré, NDLR] “did not act alone,” recalls Dusan Bozalka, a doctoral student in information sciences at the University of Paris-Panthéon-Assas.
Two other elements also come into play. “The extreme concentration of the event,” continues Tristan Mendès France. “Unlike the Covid crisis, the invasion of Ukraine, or the October 7 attack in Israel, events spread over hours, days or even months that have also given rise to numerous conspiracy theories, this one takes place in a very tight framework of a few seconds.” Everything is already there, ready to be commented on. Or almost. “The absence of proven facts” – the time taken to investigate the shooter and his motivations is necessarily longer than the time taken to comment – is a factor in the proliferation of conspiracy ideas, recalls Dusan Bozalka. At least, the first “very viral” releases on social networks, he specifies. “The real conspiracy theories, that is to say, longer and more detailed stories than simple messages, are the result of transmedia production work (articles, videos, etc.) by American conspiracy influencers.”
But Elon Musk has deliberately decided, from the start, to exploit this conspiracy “noise”. In addition to his own messages and his moral and financial support for Donald Trump, it was he who decided, when he took control of the social network in October 2022, to reinstate conspiracy theorist profiles such as Alex Jones, Andrew Tate, and Michael Flynn, from the ranks of QAnon. In total, several thousand others have been reinstated. On numerous occasions, he himself exalts conspiracy theories. On October 30, 2022, by relaying a wacky and homophobic theory concerning the husband of Nancy Pelosi, then Speaker of the House of Representatives. On March 11, 2023, by asking in a laconic tweet for the release of Jacob Chansley, the “QAnon Shaman” sentenced for his role in the assault on the Capitol to forty-one months in prison. Or through various winks, like when he summons the “white rabbit” during a message, the fact of digging intensely into a subject through his “own research”. A reference to the Matrix saga and its matrix that the QAnon community, very linked to the “magasphere”, loves.
Political shift
In the meantime, on November 25, 2022, Elon Musk reinstated Donald Trump’s account, banned after the tragic riots of January 6 at the Capitol. An event that was the catalyst for a conspiracy theory that he himself helped launch: that of the “stolen” election of November 2020, lost to Joe Biden. Even if Trump prefers to remain silent on it – except for the publication of a “mugshot”, a photo taken during his arrest in August 2023 – “the Trumposphere is on X”, notes Tristan Mendes France. And it no longer needs its leader to propagate its ideas. The system of “blue checkmarks”, acquired simply by a paid subscription, makes it possible to boost the virality of posts. Many conspiracy theorists simply access it. In France, accounts such as Silvano Trotta or Mike Borowski who launched, this Monday: “Trump on the verge of being assassinated by the deep state!”.
The consequences of these changes are now measurable. “QAnon conspiracy theories are on the rise on Elon Musk’s X,” headlined in mid-May, in an investigationthe NewsGuard organization that specializes in combating online hoaxes. “By tracking commonly used QAnon phrases like “QSentMe” [Q m’envoie]”TheGreatAwakening” [le grand réveil]Newsguard found that these QAnon-related slogans and hashtags increased by 1,283% on X under Musk. That is, from May 1, 2023 to May 1, 2024, 1.12 million mentions of these phrases compared to 81,100 mentions a year earlier, from May 1, 2022 to May 1, 2023. And this is despite QAnon having lost its luster. The leader of this movement, Q, has not posted for about three years. Several other indicators point to an increase in misinformation and hate.
This “political” shift by Musk, which benefits Donald Trump, can be explained by his libertarian ideas, classified on the right of the spectrum. A break from the rest of Silicon Valley, embodied by Musk but also by billionaire Peter Thiel or investor Marc Andreessen. Which encourages him to promote a form of full and total freedom of expression. With limits, those of the laws. But concerning conspiracy content, the latter rarely falls into illegality. “This can only be the case when conspiracy theories tip over into violence or calls for violence,” points out Tristan Mendes France. The border is often very porous and difficult for legislators to identify. “That’s what’s terrible,” sighs the specialist. “All this excitement nevertheless leads to a form of radicalism.”
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