Civil rights activist Shaun King said this week that Twitter’s sale to Elon Musk was “about white power” and “not about left vs right” in a series of tweets following the announcement of the deal.
“At its root, [Elon Musk] wanting to purchase Twitter is not about left vs right. It’s about white power. The man was raised in Apartheid by a white nationalist,” King wrote in a tweet on Monday.
“He’s upset that Twitter won’t allow white nationalists to target/ harass people. That’s his definition of free speech,” King added.
He later went on to share a screenshot of this tweet on Facebook with the caption: “I trended worldwide today because of this tweet. It’s true.”
King wrote in a separate tweet: “Elon Musk has openly called himself a ‘free speech absolutist’ and said that he wants to create a space where anything can be said about anyone. That’s why white nationalists are giddy today. Here on Twitter and other platforms that I track daily. It’s dangerous.”
He added, “I don’t even like the Democratic Party. So for me, this isn’t about left vs right. Not at all. It’s about how the richest man in the world, a son of Apartheid, raised by a white nationalist, wants to be sure his speech, and that of other white men, isn’t censored.”
King previously said when news broke of Musk’s purchase: “I truly think this is a very bad thing. For the richest man in the world to control the primary flow of information to the world.”
Although some media outlets reported that King deleted his account on Monday, he denied this in a tweet on Tuesday in response to Jack Posobiec, who tweeted “Breaking: Shaun King has deleted his Twitter account.”
“I didn’t delete my account,” King wrote. “You literally made that up. I was getting death threats and hack attempts from your buddies who stormed the Capitol and had to make it more secure. I’m right here. And you are a a (sic) white supremacist.”