After months of negotiation, Congress was close to passing a spending bill on Wednesday to avert a government shutdown. Elon Musk decided he had other ideas. He railed against the bill in more than 150 separate posts on X, complaining about the raises it would have given members of Congress, falsely exaggerating the proposed pay increase, and worrying about billions in government spending that weren’t even in the bill. He told his followers over and over that the bill was “criminal” and “should not pass.” Nothing about Musk’s campaign was subtle: “Any member of the House or Senate who votes for this outrageous spending bill deserves to be voted out in 2 years!” he posted. According to X’s stats, the posts accrued tens of millions of views.
Elected Republicans listened: By the end of the day, they had scrapped the bill. Last night, another attempt to fund the government, this time supported by Musk, also failed. After spending about $277 million to back Donald Trump’s bid for the presidency, Musk has become something of a shadow vice president. But it’s not just Musk’s political donations that are driving his influence forward. As his successful tirade against the spending bill illustrates, Musk also has outsize power to control how information is disseminated. To quote Shoshana Zuboff, an academic who has written about tech overreach and surveillance, Musk is an “information oligarch.”