Billionaire entrepreneur Elon Musk thanked the attorney general of Missouri after he announced a lawsuit against Media Matters for America for its targeting of the advertisers on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter.
“I am filing suit against Media Matters to force them to turn over documents regarding their solicitation of donations to bully advertisers into pulling out of X, the last platform dedicated to free speech in America,” read a post from AG Andrew Bailey on Monday.
Musk previously filed a lawsuit against the liberal media watchdog group, accusing it of defamation after it reported that advertisements would appear next to white supremacist messages on the social media platform. Bailey’s lawsuit made similar accusations.
“My office has reason to believe Media Matters used fraud to solicit donations from Missourians in order to bully advertisers into pulling out of X, the last social media platform dedicated to free speech in America, so we launched an investigation to get to the bottom of it,” Bailey wrote in a statement about the lawsuit. “I’m not going to let this activist group stonewall us. If there has been any attempt to defraud Missourians in order to trample on their free speech rights, I will root it out and hold bad actors accountable.”
Musk expressed his gratitude in a post on X responding to Bailey.
“Much appreciated! Media Matters is doing everything it can to undermine the First Amendment,” Musk wrote.
“Truly an evil organization,” he added.
In November, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton also announced an investigation into the organization’s practices.
“We are examining the issue closely to ensure that the public has not been deceived by the schemes of radical left-wing organizations who would like nothing more than to limit freedom by reducing participation in the public square,” said Paxton at the time.
MMFA’s president, Angelo Carusone, had previously responded to the threat of a lawsuit from Musk.
“Far from the free speech advocate he claims to be, Musk is a bully who threatens meritless lawsuits in an attempt to silence reporting that he even confirmed is accurate,” he said. “Musk admitted the ads at issue ran alongside the pro-Nazi content we identified. If he does sue us, we will win.”
Musk has also publicly lashed out at companies who removed their advertising dollars from his platform over MMFA’s accusations.
“If somebody’s gonna try to blackmail me with advertising, blackmail me with money? Go f*** yourself!” Musk said in November. “Go. F***. Yourself. Is that clear? I hope it is.”
Here’s more about the Media Matters Musk feud:
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