Musk encourages independents to vote Republican forward of midterms

New Twitter proprietor Elon Musk weighed in on the upcoming midterm elections and tweeted on Monday that “independent-minded” folks ought to vote for a Republican Congress.

“Shared energy curbs the worst excesses of each events, due to this fact I like to recommend voting for a Republican Congress, provided that the Presidency is Democratic,” Musk wrote in a tweet Monday.

In a follow-up tweet, the billionaire added, “Hardcore Democrats or Republicans by no means vote for the opposite aspect, so unbiased voters are those who really determine who’s in cost!”

Musk tweeted in April that the platform must be politically neutral with a view to preserve the general public’s belief. However in latest days Musk has hit again at lots of his critics on Twitter, together with progressive Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and replied favorably to quite a few outstanding conservative media figures.

A Republican-controlled Congress with a Democratic president would make it much less probably for main modifications impacting tech platforms to turn into legislation.

A large group of Republicans have labored with Democrats to rein within the energy of the biggest tech corporations by new competitors legal guidelines, however others are nonetheless skeptical and like to give attention to problems with content material moderation and alleged censorship of conservative viewpoints. Democrats’ strategy to content material moderation points is basically at odds with that of Republicans, which might make it onerous to cross legal guidelines on that difficulty in a carefully divided Congress.

Musk attended Home Minority Chief Kevin McCarthy’s fundraising retreat in August, and he donated over $100,000 to Republican-led teams through the 2018 midterm elections, in accordance with Federal Election Fee data.

The Tesla CEO has additionally been at odds with the Biden White Home because the president pushes for infrastructure reform and tries to encourage car corporations to go inexperienced. In an e-mail trade with CNBC in February, Musk accused President Joe Biden of ignoring his electrical car firm in favor of paying extra consideration to legacy automakers.

Musk’s tweets have come beneath intense scrutiny since he acquired Twitter final month for $44 billion. His management has been marked by huge layoffs, spending pauses from some advertisers and confusion in regards to the platform’s coverage modifications.

— CNBC’s Kevin Breuninger and Brian Schwartz contributed to this report.