Complaint alleges Musk’s America Pac deceived voters by falsely claiming prize winners would be chosen at random * US election 2024 – live updates * US election results 2024: live map and tracker Elon Musk was sued in a proposed class action on Tuesday by registered voters who signed his petition to support the constitution for a chance to win his $1m-a-day giveaway, and now claim it was a fraud. The complaint, filed by the Arizona resident Jacqueline McAferty in federal court, said Musk and his America Pac organization falsely induced voters to sign a petition by claiming they would choose winners by chance. In fact, members of the Pac selected the winners, the suit alleges. Musk’s own attorneys said in court that the sweepstakes’ results were not random; they disclosed that the winners were chosen to be spokespeople for the group. When will we know the result? Abortion ballot measure results by state Senate, House and governor results Everything you need to know Continue reading...

Feed is rife with posts of individuals deemed suspicious and calls for doxxing with little evidence provided of fault While Elon Musk faces his own election integrity questions offline, the X owner has deputized his followers to spot and report any “potential instances of voter fraud and irregularities”. The community he spawned is rife with unfounded claims passed off as evidence of voter fraud. Musk opted not to show up to a required court appearance Thursday in Philadelphia to respond to a lawsuit challenging his political action committee’s daily $1m voter giveaway. Meanwhile, online, he has started a dedicated community space on X, formerly Twitter, where he’s asked users to share any issues they see while voting. Users posting on the self-contained feed, the “election integrity community”, quickly began pointing out what they deemed as evidence of fraud and election interference. Continue reading...

Experts say top chief executives are treading a fine line to avoid any backlash in the event of a Trump victory After the January 6 attack on the US Capitol, America’s business leaders came out strongly in their criticism of Donald Trump. Now – as the Harris campaign brands Trump a “fascist” and Trump threatens retribution against “the enemy within” – there appears to be a conspiracy of silence. In fact, as the nation heads to the polls in an election that is too close to call, some of America’s most powerful chief executive appear to be cozying up to Trump again. Continue reading...

Pair stream themselves playing Madden in effort to secure votes just nine days before election Vice-presidential candidate Tim Walz and Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Sunday streamed themselves playing an American football video game against each other on Sunday as the two Democrats continued their party’s efforts to secure votes from young men just nine days before the White House election. During the stream of their showdown on the latest edition of the Madden game series, Ocasio-Cortez and Walz exalted the importance of regaining Democratic control of the US House, maintaining a majority in the Senate and ensuring Kamala Harris wins the 5 November presidential election against Donald Trump. Continue reading...

The platform’s billionaire owner has seen its value plunge as advertisers run shy, revenues drop and user numbers fall Two years ago, there was some trepidation among advertisers, anti-hate-speech groups and staff about Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter. Those concerns have been borne out: advertisers have sharply reduced spending on the platform, Musk has sued nonprofits over their coverage of a rise in controversial content and about eight out of 10 employees have been sacked. Continue reading...

America Pac is targeting users interested in the Boy Scouts of America, Kelsey Grammer, Kid Rock and Joe Rogan Elon Musk’s Pac is spending far more on ads on Facebook and YouTube than on X, Musk’s own social network. America Pac paid $201,000 to run dozens of ads on X, formerly Twitter, during the past three months. However, it spent $3m on thousands of advertisements on Facebook and Instagram in roughly the same time period. Musk founded the pro-Donald Trump Pac in July and has funded it to the tune of $75m, according to filings with the Federal Election Commission. Continue reading...

Plus: World of Warcraft, polling and cats • Don’t get TechScape delivered to your inbox? Sign up here Hello, and welcome to TechScape. I’m Blake Montgomery, technology news editor at the Guardian US. Today in TechScape I’m deciphering Elon Musk’s global political goals, a remarkable documentary filmed within World of Warcraft, polling on support for school phone bans, and cats on TikTok. Thank you for joining me. First, let’s talk about Musk’s global politics. Over the weekend, Musk pledged to give away $1m a day to registered voters in battleground states in the US who sign his Pac’s petition in support of the first and second amendments. He awarded the first prize, a novelty check the size of a kitchen island, at a Pennsylvania rally on Saturday and the second on Sunday in Pittsburgh. He says he’ll keep doing it until the election on 5 November. The stunt is potentially illegal, experts say. Continue reading...

The owner of X is just one of many who may prefer Donald Trump to greater regulation under the Democrats Way back in the 1960s “the personal is political” was a powerful slogan capturing the reality of power dynamics within marriages. Today, an equally meaningful slogan might be that “the technological is political”, to reflect the way that a small number of global corporations have acquired political clout within liberal democracies. If anyone doubted that, then the recent appearance of Elon Musk alongside Donald Trump at a rally in Pennsylvania provided useful confirmation of how technology has moved centre-stage in American politics. Musk may be a manchild with a bad tweeting habit, but he also owns the company that is providing internet connectivity to Ukrainian troops on the battlefield; and his rocket has been chosen by Nasa to be the vehicle to land the next Americans on the moon. There was a time when the tech industry wasn’t much interested in politics. It didn’t need to be because politics at the time wasn’t interested in it. Accordingly, Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Amazon and Apple grew to their gargantuan proportions in a remarkably permissive political environment. When democratic governments were not being dazzled by the technology, they were asleep at the wheel; and antitrust regulators had been captured by the legalistic doctrine peddled by Robert Bork and his enablers in the University of Chicago Law School – the doctrine that there was little wrong with corporate dominance unless it was harming consumers. The test for harm was price-gouging, and since Google’s and Facebook’s services were “free”, where was the harm, exactly? And though Amazon’s products weren’t free, the company was ruthlessly undercutting competitors’ prices and pandering to customers’ need for next-day delivery. Again: where was the harm in that? Continue reading...

Tesla and SpaceX chief’s behavior sets him apart from even the most politically active billionaires – serving as a Trump policy adviser and mega-donor Less than a month before the presidential election, Elon Musk has made himself a near-constant presence in the race. At a rally for Donald Trump in Pennsylvania, Musk jumps with glee wearing a custom black Maga hat. On social media, he posts AI-generated images attacking Kamala Harris. Behind the scenes, he bankrolls one of the largest pro-Trump political action committees. The billionaire CEO of Tesla and SpaceX has emerged as a unique influence on the campaign in ways that set him apart from even the most politically active billionaires and tech elite. He is all at once a vocal Trump surrogate, campaign mega-donor, informal policy adviser, media influencer and prolific source of online disinformation. At the same time, he is the world’s richest man and the owner of one of the United States’ most influential social networks, while also operating as a government defense contractor and wielding power over critical satellite communications infrastructure. Continue reading...

Plus: art on Samsung TVs, babies’ faces online, and the iPhone 16 Pro reviewed • Don’t get TechScape delivered to your inbox? Sign up here Hello, and welcome to TechScape. I’m Blake Montgomery, technology news editor at the Guardian US. Thank you for joining me. Continue reading...