Trump’s interview with Musk spirals into yet another X disaster.

 

Elon Musk promised entertainment but instead delivered technical difficulties.

Musk had planned to host GOP nominee Donald Trump for an interview "Live on X" (formerly Twitter Spaces) at 8 p.m. However, for the second time in the 2024 presidential election, the social media platform was glitchy, leaving many users unable to listen to the interview.

Musk later posted that there was a "massive DDOS attack on 𝕏," and said he was working on resolving the issue while considering proceeding with a smaller audience. DDOS refers to a "distributed denial of service" attack.

The interview eventually began about 45 minutes late.

The technical issues were reminiscent of Musk's previous X Live event with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who had launched his Republican primary campaign on the platform, only to face similar technical failures. Like Trump's event, the site’s audio-only livestream portal crashed.

Conservative commentator Erick Erickson humorously noted the parallel, tweeting, “I’m assuming all the Trump supporters who ridiculed DeSantis for the crashing of his Twitter Space with Musk will do the same here. LOLOLOLOL,” with a clown face emoji.

Despite Musk's preemptive system scaling tests ahead of the event, the platform couldn't avoid crashing. Some users managed to enter the live stream, but as Bloomberg’s Stephanie Lai reported, “We’re ten minutes in and there is still background music playing.” Many others couldn't access the event at all, encountering either a blank webpage or an unavailable notification.

Trump’s campaign spokesperson claimed that the event was “breaking the internet.”

Musk’s interview with Trump was intended to be the third in a series of discussions with 2024 presidential candidates who have captured the tech mogul’s interest this year. Musk has since committed to fully supporting Trump’s third campaign, offering not only his personal wealth but also the influence of his X platform to boost Trump’s reelection bid.

Once the interview finally got underway, with around 1 million listeners, Trump and Musk discussed the recent assassination attempt on Trump before launching into attacks on President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, the current Democratic nominee.

During the freewheeling conversation, Musk often agreed with Trump on topics like immigration, inflation, and crime. The discussion also touched on Trump’s legal battles and ongoing foreign conflicts, with both men occasionally rambling. 

Trump, referring to the Russia-Ukraine war, stated, “That war had zero chance of happening if I was there,” and blamed the Biden administration for allowing inflation to take root. He also criticized Harris, referencing her pledge to end taxes on tips—a proposal Trump claimed to have introduced first—and her role as the administration’s border czar.

“She was the border czar, and you people can’t allow them to get away with their disinformation campaign. Now she’s trying to say she wasn’t really involved,” Trump said.

Trump also commended Musk for his tough business practices, particularly his handling of strikes at his companies. 

“You walk in and you just say, ‘You want to quit?’ They go on strike. I won’t mention the company, but they go on strike and you say, ‘That’s ok, you’re all gone. You’re all gone,’” Trump said, adding, “And you are the greatest.”

Musk, who has previously donated to both Republicans and Democrats, has now thrown his support behind Trump, backing a new super PAC for the former president's campaign. This marks a shift toward more direct political involvement, with potential contributions to Trump's 2024 campaign through America PAC, which will disclose its finances in October.

“She’ll be worse than him,” Trump said of Harris. “Because she’s a believer in the radical left and he wasn’t.”

“I think you’re right,” Musk responded.