A Brazilian court has announced that it will open an investigation into X owner Elon Musk for obstruction of justice, after Musk reactivated far-right accounts that the Brazilian government had flagged. request deletion. The announcement was made later Gunner called demanded that Brazilian Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes, head of the country's High Electoral Tribunal (TSE) “resign or be impeached” and a statement from X alleges that the account deletion order violates the Brazilian constitution.
While the court has not released the list of accounts it ordered to be frozen or investigated, the São Paolo-based newspaper Stadium reported that it includes fugitives Far-right influencer Allan dos Santos, a supporter of president Jair Bolsonaro. (Dos Santos flee the country in 2020 to avoid investigation for spreading false information.) The list also includes right-wing YouTuber Bruno Aiub, known as Monark, who has more than 1 million followers on argued that Brazil should recognized the Nazi partyAnd Brazilian billionaire and Luciano Hang, a Bolsonaro supporter.
Additionally, after taking over the company, Musk reactivated the Brazilian's account. far right politicians Carla Zambelli, Gustavo Gayer and Nikolas Ferreira. Ferreira, a Bolsonaro supporter, was publicly questioned the safety of electronic voting machines in Brazil, even though he won local legislative races.
“All these names have been causing trouble for years on social media,” said Flora Rebello Arduini, campaign director at the nonprofit advocacy organization Ekō. “They have been promoting misinformation about the far right and elections for centuries.”
When Musk bought Twitter in 2022, later changing its name to X, many activists in Brazil worried that he would abuse the platform to promote his own agenda, Arduini said. “He has unprecedented broadcasting ability. He is bullying a supreme court judge of a democratic country, and he is showing that he will use all available resources to promote anything that favors personal views. his personal or professional ambitions.”
Under Musk, X has become a haven for far-right and misinformation. After the takeover, Musk offered amnesty to users who had been banned from the platform, include Right-wing influencer and convicted human trafficker Andrew Tate. ONE research in 2023 found that hate speech has increased on the platform under Musk's leadership. Experts told WIRED that the situation in Brazil is just the latest example of Musk linking together and promoting dangerous, far-right movements around the world. “This is not about Twitter or Brazil,” said Nina Santos, a digital democracy researcher at the Brazilian National Institute of Science & Technology who studies Brazil. It is about a global far-right strategy to overtake democracies and democratic institutions around the world.” Right. “An opinion of an American billionaire should be valued no more than a democratic institution.”
This also comes as Brazil continues its efforts to understand and investigate the causes that led to January 8, 2023, when election-denying rebels refused to accept the defeat of right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro. attack on the Brazilian legislature. The TSE, the country's electoral court, is a special judicial body that investigates election crimes and is part of the mechanism that oversees the country's entire electoral process. The court is investigating the dissemination of fake news and misinformation that cast doubt on the country's elections in the months and years leading up to the election. stormed the legislature on January 8, 2023. Both Arduini and Santos believe that the accounts that Musk refused to delete may be related to the court investigation.
