During a virtual townhall event on his social media app X, tech billionaire Elon Musk defended the legality of his super PAC’s $1 million daily giveaway to registered voters in swing states. His comments come days after the Justice Department sent a letter warning that the lottery-style contest might be unlawful.
Musk emphasized that the purpose of the contest was not to induce people to register to vote, a distinction that legal experts say is crucial, as it is illegal under federal law to pay people to register to vote. “To be clear, this is not a petition to vote for or register for anyone. It’s really a petition in support of the Constitution of the United States, and in particular, freedom of speech and the right to bear arms,” Musk said.
Since Saturday, Musk’s America PAC has been giving away $1 million a day to a registered voter in one of seven battleground states who has signed an online petition pledging support to the First and Second Amendments. The PAC is also offering $100 to Pennsylvania registered voters who sign the petition.
Musk, the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX and the world’s richest person according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, has been using his wealth and notoriety to back former President Donald Trump’s bid to return to the White House. He has given nearly $75 million to the super PAC while campaigning in-person in Pennsylvania for Trump and using his platform on X to do the same.
During the townhall, Musk took questions on various subjects, calling for cutting government programs, reducing immigration, and asserting without evidence that “there’s hardly a downtown in America that’s actually safe to walk in,” despite crime falling across the nation and being near historic lows.
Legal experts have told NBC News that Musk’s contest falls in a gray area of election law, and on Wednesday, NBC News confirmed that the Justice Department had sent a letter to Musk’s super PAC warning that the $1 million giveaway may run afoul of federal law. Musk did not mention the DOJ letter during the event, only addressing the giveaway’s legitimacy when asked by a participant.
Musk took a harsher tone toward the Justice Department on two other subjects, attacking the criminal prosecutions of Trump as being for “political reasons” and criticizing the DOJ for intervening in a lawsuit in Virginia related to immigration and that state’s voter rolls. “The DOJ priorities seem — they seem wrong,” he said.
NBCNEWS.COM
