By Hannah Murphy in San Francisco and Bryan Harris in São Paulo
Elon Musk’s X said it expects to be banned in Brazil after refusing to meet a 24-hour deadline to name a legal representative in the country, marking a major escalation in the billionaire’s feud with a top judge in Latin America’s largest economy.
The social media platform said in a post on X on Thursday that it expected that it would soon no longer be available to users in the country “simply because we would not comply with his illegal orders to censor his political opponents”.
On Wednesday, Brazil’s Supreme Court shared an order from justice Alexandre de Moraes that required the company to name a legal representative in the country or else be shut down.
X closed its Brazil office last week, stating that it had received a “secret order” from de Moraes insisting the platform take down certain accounts or its legal representative in the country would face a fine or arrest. On Thursday, X said that after its legal representative resigned, de Moraes froze her bank accounts.
“Our challenges against his manifestly illegal actions were either dismissed or ignored,” X wrote, adding: “In the days to come, we will publish all of Judge de Moraes’ illegal demands and all related court filings in the interest of transparency.”
Musk, a self-declared free speech absolutist, has repeatedly clashed with de Moraes over what he has cast as censorship requests to remove or suspend some accounts. The justice has argued the moves are part of his fight to protect democracy from misinformation and hateful content, spread typically by far-right groups.
Musk on Wednesday shared a picture of de Moraes behind bars, which appeared to have been generated by artificial intelligence, with the caption: “One day, @Alexandre, this picture of you in prison will be real. Mark my words.”
In another post on Thursday, he wrote that de Moraes was “a criminal wearing judges robes like a Halloween costume”.
Musk has previously called for de Moraes “to resign or be impeached”, earning a swift rebuke from large parts of Brazil’s political establishment.
President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has repeatedly sought to cast Musk as an out-of-touch billionaire. “There is clearly a far-right articulation in the world. [Musk] might be a piece of it,” Luís Roberto Barroso, the current president of the Supreme Court, told the Financial Times in May. “Some people invoke freedom of expression when truly they are defending a business model based on engagement and, unfortunately, hatred, sensationalism [and] conspiracy theories.”
Separately on Thursday, Starlink, Musk’s satellite network, posted that it had received an order from de Moraes earlier this week freezing its finances and blocking it from conducting financial transactions in Brazil.
Local press have reported that the decision to block Starlink accounts in Brazil was part of an attempt to collect fines levied on X for failing to comply with court orders.
It is the latest spat between the Tesla and SpaceX chief executive and a government as the entrepreneur has increasingly weighed in on foreign politics through the platform he bought for $44bn, championing rightwing politicians globally while attacking leftwing leaders.
Earlier this month, Musk criticised the UK prime minister, Sir Keir Starmer, for his handling of anti-immigrant rioting and started a war of words with Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro, resulting in the platform being blocked in the country by the authoritarian socialist for 10 days. He also interviewed Donald Trump, the former US president and current Republican candidate, on the platform.
The move is likely to hurt X at a time when the company has been struggling to maintain financial health, with advertisers ditching the platform over Musk’s light-touch approach to moderation as well as his sometimes erratic posting.
The ban also comes a day after Russia-born Telegram founder Pavel Durov, another social platform chief executive who has opted for a hands-off approach to moderation, faced preliminary charges in France after being unexpectedly arrested for alleged complicity in criminal activity hosted on his app.
The stance of both tech executives has prompted global debate over the extent to which social media platforms should prioritise freedom of expression over online safety.
De Moraes has spearheaded a judicial crackdown against online disinformation but is a controversial figure who divides opinion in Brazil.
Supporters say he helped secure democracy in the face of attacks on the reliability of the country’s electronic voting system by former president Jair Bolsonaro in the 2022 polls. However, Bolsonaro’s rightwing followers have alleged the judge curbed freedom of expression and unfairly targeted conservatives.
Source: Financial Times
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