Twitter CEO Elon Musk over the weekend reactivated Donald Trump’s beforehand banned Twitter account, triggering massive questions on how the transfer would possibly reshape Trump’s 2024 enchantment and the way it might have an effect on extremist exercise on the platform. However one factor it instantly clarified is the form of political actor Musk is evolving into and the way he envisions Twitter’s future.

When Musk first expressed curiosity in shopping for Twitter, there have been many theories on what motivated him. In mild of the truth that he already owned two different influential firms targeted on engineering options, it was unclear if he was seeking to sincerely enhance a website he seen as a online game, or searching for to build up social energy and enhance his companies’ backside line, or if he was merely an excessively bored, excessively wealthy man having amusing. These explanations should illuminate a part of why he acted the way in which he did. However it’s now unattainable to disregard the rising actuality that Musk values proudly owning Twitter as a robust weapon for right-wing activism.

On Friday Musk despatched out a 24-hour “ballot” to his followers on whether or not they wished Trump’s account to be reinstated. After a slim majority of customers who responded to the ballot in his tweet responded affirmatively, he reactivated Trump’s account, and tweeted, “The folks have spoken. Trump can be reinstated. Vox populi, Vox dei,” utilizing the Latin for “The voice of the folks is the voice of God.”

It is necessary to not solely observe the result of Trump’s reactivation, but in addition how Musk framed it. Bear in mind, within the wake of Jan. 6, Twitter had determined to completely ban Trump as a result of it believed “the risk of further incitement of violence,” in violation of its insurance policies, was too excessive. Musk did not tackle this criterion of incitement to violence in his public feedback about reinstating Trump. Nor was the reinstatement a stand in opposition to all everlasting bans within the identify of free speech — only a couple weeks prior, Musk promised to completely ban impersonators on Twitter with out warning. (Notably, the impersonator ban popped up solely after folks started impersonating Musk en masse.)

What Musk did was sweep the query of violence below the rug by framing this as a matter of democracy by way of a “ballot.” In fact, no scientific survey or referendum might be administered by way of a spontaneous tweet to 1’s personal followers. Solely a small fraction of Twitter’s consumer base voted, and most very properly could not have recognized about its existence. Musk additionally knew that due to his quickly rising right-wing fan base — and the sluggish trickle of liberal-leaning customers off of Twitter altogether — it was possible that his ballot would get traction on the fitting and skew towards a “sure” response. So when he mentioned “the folks have spoken,” what he actually meant was “my legions of right-wing followers have swarmed this on-line ballot that I lobbed to them to ship me a false mandate.”

In his presentation of his fake referendum as a win for “the folks,” Musk seems to be making an attempt on right-wing populism for measurement. And it is solely the newest signal that he views Twitter as a platform for advancing his political agenda as he develops more and more pronounced far-right views.

Musk’s transient tenure at Twitter to date has been marked by excessive chaos: mass firings, advert hoc insurance policies which can be typically suspended or inconsistently utilized, and contradictory messaging about what Twitter does and would not stand for. However his conduct appears extra intelligible whether it is understood as crafting a political challenge.

Take into account Musk’s botched rollout of Twitter Blue, which he initially pitched as a approach for Twitter to construct income by charging customers $8 a month to unlock, amongst different issues, a blue verification badge sometimes reserved for public figures like authorities officers, journalists and celebrities. Musk’s schemes immediately bumped into extraordinarily predictable issues, with impersonations and disinformation brokers working wild, in a single main case inflicting an impersonated firm to lose enormous quantities of cash. Twitter Blue was a large number and the brand new subscription plan was rapidly suspended. Notably, Musk’s thought for Twitter Blue — which he says he’ll revive sooner or later in revised kind — is very questionable as a plan for serving to Twitter construct sustainable income.

There’s, nevertheless, one apparent worth proposition for insisting on altering the verification system: diluting the facility of left-leaning media, and boosting right-wing disinformation networks. Musk has described the concept of increasing entry to blue examine verification badges as “the great leveler” and as a method to disrupt the power {of professional} journalists. The thought is that by making blue verification badges way more extensively out there, centrist and liberal-leaning media, which tends to be more and more skeptical of Musk and lots of the political points he is more and more dedicated to, may have much less affect of their means to set narratives. (The blue badges confer a sure diploma of authority and credibility in on-line discourse as a result of they’ve traditionally been given to professionals who will endure prices for sharing false info.) Within the course of, Musk isn’t solely aiming to defang criticism of his work and his political challenge, but in addition obliterating one of the crucial refined and least intrusive methods to mitigate the unfold of disinformation on-line.

There are additionally different indicators that Musk is making an attempt to make Twitter a house for the fitting. Simply days after taking up Twitter, Musk formally endorsed congressional Republicans for the midterm elections, hoping to assist whip up pleasure and assist for the purple wave that by no means got here.

This was a placing transfer for the brand new government of a social media firm promising to champion freedom of speech. In fact Musk is permitted to precise his views, however his instantaneous partisan intervention additionally raised questions of whether or not he’d exploit his energy over Twitter’s algorithms and insurance policies to favor political actions that he sympathizes with or finds extra personally worthwhile.

One other fascinating phenomenon is that Musk is continually publicly interacting with and seeming to hunt the approval of far-right commentators, typically from pretty area of interest components of American conservative discourse. If Musk is as targeted on “humanity” as he says he’s, would not he be extra excited about listening to folks throughout the political spectrum? If he was actually excited about enhancing one of the crucial influential digital public squares within the anglophone world, would not he in all probability much less attentive to authoritarian political scenes?

In actuality there isn’t a proof that Musk views Twitter by way of the lens of enriching society as a complete, or constructing a civic house that is designed to fulfill the wants of an enormous and sophisticated world society on-line. Quite, he appears more and more to view his followers and right-wing thinkers as his base, and he desires to cater to them and amplify their energy. (Sound acquainted?)

Musk’s sport is changing into more and more apparent, and the pursuits he has in taking part in this sport are additionally apparent. Because the richest man on Earth and a proudly exploitative government, he has a direct curiosity in amplifying the facility of the fitting. He shares the Republican Occasion’s hostility to unions, increased tax charges on companies and the ultra-wealthy, and laws on companies. He additionally appears to seek out the left’s rising give attention to anti-bigotry off-putting, and he would not like challenges to his authority.

As my colleague Chris Hayes put it: “Nothing on the planet is much less shocking and simpler to know than a right-wing billionaire buying a media entity and instantly making an attempt to make use of it to pursue his ideological agenda and sophistication pursuits.” Sounds about proper.