Elon Musk’s mother, Maye Musk, appeared to encourage a form of voter fraud in a post on X.”
“The Democrats have given us another option. You don’t have to register to vote,” Musk’s mother wrote in the Oct. 5 post. “On Election Day, have 10 fake names, go to 10 polling booths and vote 10 times. That’s 100 votes, and it’s not illegal. Maybe we should work the system too.”
Musk later called the post sarcastic in response to criticism, but did not delete the post.
Her post appeared to be echoing conspiracy theories about large-scale voter fraud that have been shared by Elon Musk. In reality, investigations have found voter fraud to be a rare occurrence. Democrats have not been found to be orchestrating an operation of the type Maye Musk mentioned.
But if voters were to follow Maye Musk’s call to “work the system too,” they would most likely be in violation of election law, said Nate Persily, an election expert at Stanford Law School and an NBC News contributor.
Title 52 of the United States’ code says it is illegal to use false information to register to vote. Violations are punishable by a $10,000 fine or up to five years imprisonment.
What’s more, a fake name isn’t enough to get you on the voter rolls. Registering to vote requires proof of identity, such as a driver’s license number or the last four digits of your Social Security number. That information is later checked by election officials, and if voters don’t provide it, they will be asked for a utility bill or other proof of residency can be used depending on the state.
Musk’s post was flagged with a “Community Note” that pointed out that registering to vote under a false name and casting more than one vote “is, in fact, illegal.” The Federal Elections Commission declined to comment on Musk’s post or if it was investigating it.
The code, however, does not appear to forbid Maye Musk’s statements of encouragement, Persily said.
“There is a lot of untrue information that circulates on social media with respect to voting,” Persily said. “The fact that someone makes an exaggerated statement like this does not seem to me like it’s a prosecutable offense.”
Three hours after the original post, Maye Musk made another one telling users to ignore the first one. She also replied in comments to various users concerned with the misinformation in her post, saying that they “don’t understand sarcasm” and adding that “this comes from Gavin Newsom,” the California governor who signed off on Senate Bill 1174, which prevents local governments from imposing voter ID requirements in local elections.
Elon Musk has similarly condemned the bill in various posts on X, including one in which he wrote that “they just made PREVENTING voter fraud against the law” and compared Newsom, a Democrat, to “The Joker.”
Persily said that many states, including New York, Massachusetts, and Minnesota, do not require voters to bring identification to the polls and that, despite this, there is no evidence that there are different rates of fraud between states that have more lenient voter identification laws and those with stricter ones.
Maye Musk’s post was made the same day her son spoke at a rally for former President Donald Trump in Butler, Pennsylvania — the same place Trump was injured in an assassination attempt in July.
At Saturday’s rally, while encouraging people in the crowd to vote, Musk said that “if they don’t, this will be the last election.” His mother’s post on X was also in response to one of his posts pushing people to register to vote, reminding them of the deadline to so in Georgia.
During his speech at the rally, Musk reiterated his disapproval for legislation that does not require voter identification.
“You got 14 states now that don’t require voter ID,” Musk said. “California, where I used to live, just passed a law banning voter ID, for voting. I still can’t believe that’s real. So, how you supposed to have a good, proper election if there’s no ID? It’s meaningless.”
Critics of laws requiring voter ID say that the requirements prevent voter turnout of eligible voters who may not have government-issued forms of ID like a driver’s license because of financial or other constraints. Proponents of the laws say that they prevent voter fraud, which studies have found to be an extremely rare occurrence.
Musk publicly endorsed Trump’s campaign on X following the assassination attempt in July, and he has since joined other tech millionaires in vowing to donate to the pro-Trump super PAC, America PAC, which Musk started.
Musk’s posts on X regarding the election, many of which have been deemed as false or misleading, have generated around 1.2 billion views, according to a report by the nonprofit Center for Countering Digital Hate. Out of 50 posts from Musk containing misinformation that researchers from the center analyzed this year, none were flagged with a “Community Note” correcting or adding context to his claims.
“It is quite clear that there is a substantial minority of the American population that does not believe the election will be run with integrity, or that the results can be trusted,” Persily said. “And it is extremely difficult to counteract those beliefs when people with large megaphones are spreading falsehoods. Ultimately, the real question is whether the people will act on these kinds of posts.”
Elon and Maye Musk did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
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