Elon Musk: the man, the myth, the voting machine hacker? According to a growing faction of leftist conspiracy theorists on social media, the 2024 election wasn’t won fair and square by president-elect Donald J. Trump – it was supposedly stolen from Kamala Harris by Musk’s Starlink satellites.
Yes, the very same satellites that bring internet to rural America are now accused of toppling democracy. The internet rumor mill kicked into high gear after election night, with claims flooding X and beyond. The theory? Apparently, Musk’s satellites stealthily connected to voting machines and deleted 20 million Democratic votes.
So… 13.7 million Democratic votes missing
Elon Musk offered Starlink to help election tabulationElon Musk destroys several Starlink satellites after Tuesday
Nothing to see here !!!
— JoeyBonanno (@RealJoeBonanno) November 10, 2024
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I agree. Let’s do a recount.First, we’ll re-count 2020. Then, we’ll re-count 2024 and show you everything.
That’s the difference. We can be afford to be transparent.
Why?
WE DIDN’T RIG AN ELECTION.
– pic.twitter.com/zkdXiPgok5— Tim Cramer (@CramerSez) November 11, 2024
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These imaginative left-wing claims gained traction when one of social media’s favorite conspiracy peddlers, journalist Wayne Madsen, chimed in saying in a Threads post, “I spent my early career in computer security for the Navy and NSA. I’m beginning to believe our election was massively hacked just like happened a few weeks ago in the Republic of Georgia. Think Elon Musk, StarLink, Peter Thiel, Bannon, Flynn and Putin. 20 million Democratic votes don’t disappear on their own.”
The story got enough heat to prompt fact-checking by outlets like Al Jazeera, leftist PolitiFact, and Meta’s misinformation brigade. Their verdict? In a word: False. It’s up to YOU who you think have more credibility – Al Jazeera, PolitiFact and Facebook – or Democrat voters. Difficult choice, I know.
Election denier heaven: Starlink edition.
As the Starlink story gathered momentum, Democrats, the very people who rolled their eyes at GOP election conspiracies in 2020, found themselves on the opposite side of the “denier” coin.
There were a few people I found on X who still have common sense though. One of those folks is Paul Gronke, a Reed College political science professor who said, “If the final results show that 20 million fewer votes were cast for the Democratic candidate for President in 2024 than in 2020, what that indicates is that 20 million voters made a decision not to cast a ballot, either not turn out at all, or not check the top contest. That’s the end of the story.”
Even Jen Easterly, head of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, was pulled in to issue a statement assuring the public that no satellites (or nefarious billionaires) altered votes. But according to the election deniers and conspiracy theorists, she is most likely part of the cover-up.
Recounts & retweets: the plot thickens.
Not willing to let go of their theory just yet, many Kamala supporters are calling for a recount. They believe a second look at the votes will “reveal” the missing millions. Social media is already abuzz with the hashtag #Recount.
So far it looks like Elon’s taking the high orbit on this one, staying as silent as a satellite in deep space. Maybe he’s busy recalibrating Starlink to beam down a response.
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