Topline

Elon Musk, the owner of billionaire X and outspoken supporter of former President Donald Trump, made a bizarre post taking aim at Taylor Swift shortly after she made her long-awaited endorsement of Vice President Kamala Harris. He declared that he would “give you a child and guard your cats with my life,” mocking X.

Key Facts

Main Critics

Musk was quickly lambasted online. A post on X, which was liked more than 132,000 times, condemned Musk’s post as “possibly one of the creepiest posts of all time.” Popular left-wing Twitch streamer Hasan Piker received nearly 40,000 likes for a post calling Musk a “gross piece of shit,” while Brett Meiselas, founder of left-wing media company Meidas Touch, received 35,000 likes for saying that Musk “telling Taylor Swift he’s going to get her pregnant is the height of weirdo and creeper behavior.”

News Pin

Billionaire pop star Swift endorsed Harris after significant voter and media speculation about whether she would weigh in on the race. Swift called Harris a “steady, gifted leader” in an Instagram post to her 283 million followers shortly after Tuesday’s presidential debate, saying she believes “we can accomplish so much more in this country if we are led by calm and not chaos.”

Tangent

Swift has largely stayed out of politics during her career, though she did endorse President Joe Biden in 2020 and previously gave her first political endorsement to Democrat Phil Bredesen over Republican Marsha Blackburn in the 2018 Senate race in Tennessee. Vote.org has said that Swift’s political statements have led to spikes in voter registration, with nearly 65,000 registrations among voters ages 18 to 29 in the 24 hours following her 2018 endorsement.

Main background

Musk has become a highly vocal supporter of Trump in the run-up to the 2024 presidential election. The most-followed person on X, Musk frequently spouts right-wing rhetoric to his 197 million followers, and he told the Wall Street Journal in July that he plans to donate $45 million a month to the pro-Trump America PAC (the billionaire denied the report but acknowledged that he makes “lower-level” donations). Musk interviewed Trump in an interview on X in August, and Trump said last week that if he wins, Musk has agreed to lead a “commission on government efficiency charged with conducting a full financial and performance audit of the entire federal government.”

Forbes rating

Forbes estimates that Musk is worth $248.7 billion as of Wednesday morning, making him the richest man in the world. Much of his wealth comes from his stakes in Tesla and SpaceX, and he also owns an estimated 74% of X. Swift is worth an estimated $1.3 billion. She became a billionaire in October 2023, the first musician to rise to the ranks based on her songs and performances.

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