Brasília: A Brazilian Supreme Court judge on Friday ordered the suspension of Elon Musk's X social media network in the country, after a months-long standoff over disinformation in South America's largest nation. The judge, Alexandre de Moraes, handed down the ruling after Musk failed to comply with an order to name a new legal representative for the company.
Musk, who also owns Tesla and SpaceX, reacted with fury, branding Moraes an "evil dictator cosplaying as a judge" and accusing him of "trying to destroy democracy in Brazil."
Alexandre de Moraes is an evil dictator cosplaying as a judge. https://t.co/ZIV8KbDCmk
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 30, 2024
"Free speech is the bedrock of democracy and an unelected pseudo-judge in Brazil is destroying it for political purposes," the billionaire, who has become increasingly aligned with right-wing politics, wrote on X. The two have been locked in an ongoing, high-profile feud for months as Moraes leads a battle against disinformation in Brazil.
Musk has previously declared himself a "free speech absolutist," but since he took over the platform formerly known as Twitter in 2022 he has been accused of turning it into a megaphone for right-wing conspiracy theories.
He is a vocal supporter of former US president Donald Trump's bid to regain the White House. Moraes ordered the "immediate, complete and comprehensive suspension of the operation of" X in the country, telling the national communications agency to take "all necessary measures" to implement the order within 24 hours.
He threatened a fine of 50,000 reais ($8,900) to anyone who used "technological subterfuges" to get around the block, such as a VPN. He also demanded Google, Apple and internet providers to "introduce technological obstacles capable of preventing the use of the X application" and access to the website -- though he later walked back that order.
The social media platform has more than 22 million users in Brazil. Musk shut X's business operations in Brazil earlier this month, claiming Moraes had threatened the company's previous legal representative with arrest to force compliance with "censorship orders." On Wednesday, Moraes told Musk he had 24 hours to find a new representative or he would face suspension.
Shortly after the deadline passed, X said in a statement that it expected Moraes to shut it down "simply because we would not comply with his illegal orders to censor his political opponents."
'Who does Musk think he is?'
The standoff with Musk began when Moraes ordered the suspension of several X accounts belonging to supporters of Brazil's former far-right president Jair Bolsonaro, who tried to discredit the voting system in the 2022 election, which he lost.
Brazilian authorities are investigating whether Bolsonaro plotted a coup attempt to prevent current President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva from assuming office in January 2023.
Online users blocked by Moraes include figures like far-right ex-congressman Daniel Silveira, who was sentenced to nine years in prison in 2022 on charges of leading a movement to overthrow the Supreme Court.
In April, Moraes ordered an investigation of Musk, accusing him of reactivating some of the banned accounts. On Thursday, Musk's satellite internet operator Starlink said it had received an order from Moraes that froze its accounts and prevented it from conducting financial transactions in Brazil.
Starlink alleged that the order "is based on an unfounded determination that Starlink should be responsible for the fines levied -- unconstitutionally -- against X." The company said on X that it intended "to address the matter legally."
Musk is also the subject of a separate judicial investigation into an alleged scheme where public money was used to orchestrate disinformation campaigns in favor of Bolsonaro and those close to him. "Any citizen from anywhere in the world who has investments in Brazil is subject to the Brazilian Constitution and laws," Lula told a local radio station on Friday. "Who does (Musk) think he is?"
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