Elon Musk’s Scam To Pay Trump Supporters $47 Is More Sinister Than You Think

Elon Musk’s super PAC is currently paying $47 to people who refer people to sign a petition in swing states supporting the First and Second Amendments. But as Democratic strategist Max Burns points out, this isn’t about supporting Amendments that aren’t going anywhere, this is about collecting data from millions of Americans that will be worth far more than the $47 that Musk is paying for it. Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins explains what’s happening.

Subscribe to stay connected to our stories

Support us by becoming a member on YouTube

Or Support us on Patreon

Buy Ring of Fire merch

Find us on social media!

*This transcript was generated by a third-party transcription software company, so please excuse any typos.

Last Monday. So a week ago, Elon Musk through his super pac, the America Pac, announced that they would be paying $47 to every single person who signed a petition and referred a friend who lives in a swing state to also sign that petition. Elon Musk got on his Twitter account and said that This is Easy money folks. I give you $47. You just gotta find a friend willing to sign this petition. And of course, this is all to support Donald Trump. And the petition is just a stupid petition. It says We support the first and second amendments. That's it, that's what the petition is. It's dumb. Nobody is coming after the first or second Amendment. Other than of course, people like Elon Musk, who is arbitrarily banning people from his Twitter platform. Granted, that's not a First Amendment violation, but he is not a free speech warrior.

He is the biggest, uh, anti-free speech crybaby in this country, folks. So is Donald Trump. For the record, he's the one who wants to sue these media companies and strip them of their broadcast licenses because he doesn't like that they've been so-called Nice to Vice President Harris. But I digress. If you sign Elon's stupid little petition saying, I support free speech and guns, and then get a friend to do the same. If the friend lives in a swing state, you get $47. Seems pretty dumb, right? Seems like a good way to lose a lot of money. And Elon Musk said it would go on for two weeks. Well already one week down, one week to go. But according to Democratic sta uh, strategist Max Burns writing for the Hill, there's something more sinister to this Musk plan. And here it is. Musk's goal is to collect information from at least 1 million voters in states, including Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, and North Carolina.

All states were Kamala Harris leads, or very narrowly trails. Trump information gathered by Musk's political action committee could then be used to target misinformation at persuadable voters. Something Musk routinely engages in on his personal ex account, which of course, yes, Elon Musk is a known purveyor of misinformation through his own account, he has bolstered conspiracy theories. Sometimes just doing things like interesting makes you think, just stupid stuff like that. But by posting it, he's boosting it. Burns continues. We don't need to speculate on how Musk might abuse the mountain of data he wants to collect. Either officials in Michigan and North Carolina are already investigating his political action committee for an alleged false voter registration scheme. America Pac allegedly

Promised to register prospective voters in exchange for their personal information, but instead took it, uh, took the personal data and ran. Both of those states are also part of Musk's latest pay for signatures efforts. Musk and other mega rich Trump supporters wanna believe that other people's principles can be bought for as little as $47. That's because so many of them sold their own principles to the MAGA movement for far less, in Musk case for nothing, but a heavy round of public mockery. But regular Americans are motivated by real deeply held values, and that's why these cynical Electioneering schemes keep failing and why Trump's polling keeps falling. So, I don't know if Musk is, is trying to, you know, get people's personal data to target them with misinformation. But what I do know is that your personal data, when it's sold out there to all these companies that wanna sell you garbage, you don't need, it's worth a hell of a lot more than $47.