OAN’s James Meyers
2:05 PM – Monday, December 11, 2023
After five years of being banned on X, current Chairman and CTO Elon Musk has restored the X account of known conspiracy theorist, Alex Jones.
The move was done on Saturday by the Tesla CEO, after announcing he would post a poll on whether or not users supported Jones’ return to the site.
Jones and his company InfoWars were kicked off, in what was announced as a permanent ban from Twitter, the platforms former name, in 2018.
“Reinstate Alex Jones on this platform?” Musk wrote, alongside “Vox Populi, Vox Dei” — a Latin phrase meaning “the voice of the people is the voice of God,” and the results of the poll showed that 70% of respondents supported the restoration of Jones’ account.
“The people have spoken and so it shall be,” Musk added.
Musk bought Twitter at the end of 2022 in a $44 billion deal. Since then, he has restored several accounts that were banned under previous ownership, such as the accounts of Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) and former President Donald Trump.
However, critics are calling out Musk for going back on his word.
He claimed last year that he would not reinstate Jones’ account on X. Musk said, “No,” to requests for Jones to come back and wrote in a November 2022 post, “My firstborn child died in my arms. I felt his last heartbeat. I have no mercy for anyone who would use the deaths of children for gain, politics or fame.”
Jones is known for saying the shooting at Sandy Hook was a “hoax.” As a result of his statement, Jones has faced multiple defamation lawsuits and has been ordered to pay upwards of $1 billion to the victims’ families, which left 26 people dead.
Additionally, in another post on X shared by Musk on Saturday, Musk said “I vehemently disagree with what he said about Sandy Hook, but are we a platform that believes in freedom of speech or are we not?”
“That is what it comes down to in the end. If people vote him back on, this will be bad for X financially, but principles matter more than money,” he wrote.
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