Elon Musk’s unconventional and highly entertaining swing through Pennsylvania in support of Donald Trump could make a big impact in the final days of the campaign in what is shaping up to be the most important swing state in the country.
Musk already made waves in the race for the White House earlier this summer when he endorsed Trump in an X post just hours after the former president was nearly killed near Butler, Pennsylvania. That post, which included a video of Trump pumping his fist after being grazed by an assassin’s bullet, has now garnered some 220 million views.
But unlike most celebrity endorsements which end with a few supportive words on social media and perhaps some appearances on friendly cable news networks, Musk has devoted significant time and energy to making the case for Trump directly to voters. In addition to investing a reported $75 million to elect Trump through his America PAC, Musk has on a daily basis shared pro-Trump messaging to his 202 million followers on X, which he owns, and has even sparred with liberal media pundits about why a Kamala Harris presidency would be so disastrous for the country.
In his latest effort to boost Trump, Musk embarked on a tour across Pennsylvania, hosting a series of townhalls in the state he has called the “linchpin” for the 2024 election. Hundreds of Trump supporters, Musk enthusiasts, and curious locals gathered to hear the idiosyncratic billionaire speak on a range of issues, ranging from SpaceX’s recent launches to concerns about electronic voting machines.
A major theme of Musk’s appearances has been encouraging Pennsylvanians to register to vote and register their friends and family to vote. The deadline to register to vote in the Keystone State was October 21.
Musk’s America PAC began its voter registration drive in battleground states earlier this fall by offering people $47 (Trump would become the 47th president if he is re-elected) if they get one registered voter to sign a petition supporting the First and Second Amendments to the Constitution. The initiative is a clever way to skirt campaign finance laws which forbid direct payments for registering to vote.
Musk upped the ante last week in Pennsylvania by offering $100 instead of $47. He also announced that America PAC would be giving away $1 million to a random petition signer every day through the election. A Pennsylvania man named John Dreher became the first $1 million winner in Harrisburg on Saturday.
At the townhalls themselves, Musk has also made a compelling case for Trump – not from the perspective of a politician, but from the perspective of one of the greatest innovators, visionaries, and business leaders of this century. “Kamala is just a puppet, if the teleprompter breaks, she doesn’t know what to say,” Musk said at one rally. “I just call it ‘The Machine.’ When the Biden puppet was not working out, they got a new puppet. It’s all the same machine. It’s undemocratic what was done to Biden. It’s bizarre to claim Trump is a danger to democracy when what happened to Biden was entirely undemocratic. It doesn’t make sense.”
At another rally, Musk slammed Democrats’ efforts to import mass numbers of illegal aliens into swing states. “The Democrats are bringing in illegals, deliberately, into swing states,” he said. “When you look at margins of victories that may be 10-20,000 votes, and then you bring in 200,000 illegals and you legalize them, then you won’t have any swing states. Every state will go blue. Then at that point you don’t have a democracy.”
In one of the more amusing clips to come out of the events, Musk detailed the infuriating level of bureaucracy that SpaceX had to navigate in order to obtain permission to launch rockets. Some of that red tape included performing studies to assess the risks to sharks and whales from SpaceX rockets landing in the ocean. The company also had to capture a seal and perform tests on it to ensure that the sonic boom from SpaceX launches wouldn’t “distress” the slippery mammals too much.
While it might be easy to dismiss a handful of relatively small townhalls as a gimmick or sideshow, the panicked reaction from elected Democrats and the media shows just how effective Musk’s Keystone State tour could be.
Pennsylvania Democrat Governor Josh Shapiro was so alarmed about Musk’s $1 million giveaway, in fact, that he went on NBC to suggest that law enforcement should “take a look” at the move. Pennsylvania Democrat Senator John Fetterman likewise warned that while Democrats “make fun of [Musk] jumping up and down and things like that… I would just say that they are doing that at our peril.” The New York Times, meanwhile, worried that “Musk is betting on his own persuasive powers to help Mr. Trump win.”
During a time when high-profile individuals like Musk invite vilification in the media and ostracization from their peers for breaking with Democrat Party orthodoxy, Musk’s personal courage in strongly backing Trump also should not be ignored. As Musk himself has acknowledged, in addition to making himself persona non grata with the media and societal elites who used to embrace him, his support for Trump has led to death threats and open hostility from the Biden administration toward the companies he owns. “Hopefully I don’t get a shot,” Musk joked after handing out the first $1 million check in Pennsylvania, dubbing himself “public enemy no. 2” behind Trump.
If Trump indeed wins Pennsylvania this year, particularly if he wins it close, we may well look back on Musk’s recent efforts there as a critical factor.
Shane Harris is a writer and political consultant from Southwest Ohio. You can follow him on X @shaneharris513.
Amazing [not really] that DIMMs had NOTHING to say about Zuckerberg spending $600 million in 2020 propping up DIMM candidates but are complaining about Musk! Musk is on a par with Ben Franklin or Thomas Jefferson as an inventor and patriot!
The democrats make normal thinking people enemies. Their hatred of anything Republican is a disease. Trump and Musk and anyone else opposing their policies is branded as dangerous. If Trump is so dangerous wouldn’t he have done it when he was president. What the democrats are worried about that they really went too far with their satanic hatred policies of the past 4 years and are deathly afraid that they will be criminally charged under a Republican president. It doesn’t matter if it was DeSantis or Vivek the dems would have done the same thing. They know they went too far. Politicizing the FBI, CIA, DOJ, IRS, buying off judges and DA’s with Soros money. We are not a constitutional Republic any more. We are not a democracy. We are ordered to obey the trans movement in this country, the open borders and support millions of illegals while with the inflation people go hungry. Disasters occurring in this country we the people are told by the president to help out. Because FEMA money went to the illegals from countries all over the world even from adversarial countries. The democrats are dangerous. They are bankrupting the country and it’s people. They don’t care about any of us. They pander to their constituents to get their vote and once elected they forget about them. As long as you do what they say like Obama ordered the black men to vote for Harris. They are not seen as individuals with their own thoughts and ideas, you ain’t black if you don’t vote for Harris. Wasn’t that a slogan Biden said during his campaign in 2020. They know they have failed America. Obama started the destruction of America in 2008. He dismissed the Republicans as stupid “Teabaggers”. And dang in 2016 a smart upstart businessman named Trump won the election. Throwing a monkey wrench in Obama’s plan for a third term. Trump saved America. Made her prosperous, safe and peaceful nation. Obama wants it to fail and become a communist country and Musk sees what the ultra left via the dems are doing. Destroying America from within. It started in 2008 and with the help of MSM propaganda we have what we have now puppet presidents. A vote for Harris is a vote for Obama’s 4th term and the destruction of America. Its constitution and its freedoms. To keep it every vote is important. That is what Musk is doing to keep America free. VOTE TRUMP VANCE.
I admire Musk for supporting Trump. It is the right thing to do. Trump is a good man regardless of how the liberals try to portray him and convict him on baloney charges.
Musk demonstrates the fickle adoration of the mainstream press. While he was building those wonderful and expensive EVs and forging ahead in developing space vehicles, he was a great and brilliant hero in the press. But when he bought Twitter and removed it from the liberal government-media free speech averse cabal, he was no longer embraced by Liberal Land. After he endorsed Trump, he became an evil right winger as far as Liberal Land is concerned. Some Loony Tune Hollywood elites sold their Teslas to demonstrate their dislike for him. Political positions are more important than accomplishments to Liberals, as the Biden-Harris Regime has demonstrated in multiple ways since 2020.
Elon Musk is a heroic person, who intervened when he saw enormous wrongs committed by the “democrats” against American citizens. He is a real humanitarian who resists and repels dictatorial forces, like our errant “Democrat” Party.
At least Musk can afford the legal fees, because they are already going after him. I just HOPE that Trump can pull out a victory and that he appoints Musk to weed out the government bloat and waste. Kind of like the movie “Dave” with Kevin Kline! This needs to be started on Day 1, right after Musk makes the government employees still working from home (even Biden said come back) return to the office to explain what they’ve been doing for 3 years.
Musk has said, and I think he sincerely means it, that this election will decide the future of Western Civilization. I agree with him. We are at a tipping point in history right now.
How much worse must the situation we are in be before people realize that spending money we don’t have does not work, that you can’t spend your way out of debt. Only brutal cuts to bare necessities can do that .It is possible, there is so much money wasted and unaccounted for , no one held responsible for fraud and theft ,it’s criminal
Glad that Elon Musk jumped across the political divide. It took having a business based in California to open his eyes to the consequences of failing liberal “leadership.” Now he’s another target of the liberal snowflakes, so I’m PRAYING for a Trump victory so Elon can be part of DJT’s Cabinet and start cutting away at the government pork. Please start with the 85,000 IRS employees.
AMAC, keep up the good work!
Democrats making this a Big Issue and making Elon and Trump look like they are wrong. Celebrities have donated to Democrats..and that is okay. This is Elon personal money and he chooses to do this, it is his financial responsibility no body’s business.
WOULD ONE FOLLOW A GENIUS like MUSK or a failure like Kamala? If you want Economic growth and security of our country, the choice is easy, but if you want poverty, failures and wars….then Kamala is for you. May the Lord bless us all with wisdom when we vote.
Musk uses his own money: illegal? Kamala promises tax-payer money: legal? As “ironical” as accusing Trump of election interference in documents released to the press to influence an election. Laws for thee, not for me… where’s Kamala’s planning to party if she wins, French Laundry?
All I can say is “Soros.” How is that just fine but Musk is vilified?
Great Article.
What Musk does Best Hooray
“TheNew York Times, meanwhile, that “Musk is betting on his own persuasive powers to help Mr. Trump win.”
Liberals don’t seem too concerned that komrade is not making anymore campaign appearances, but that O’webama is filling in for her, which is definitely not allowed. Gotta keep those divisions between Americans alive, don’tcha know. Hope it fails. We are finally becoming one America, regardless of race.
Most articles, if not all, are pretty good and rooted in conservative values. Its too bad there are not a lot more comments. It might be good to recommend AMAC to folks you know to build the audience they can reach. FYI, I do not work for AMAC:-)
A really good person to have on our side,the conservative side,the side when AMERICA was much better off many years ago before the liberal,leftist,socialist democ rats changed their agenda.The new stench in the air is the stench of a rotting marxist corpse.
Musk is a brave an awesome man, as well as Trump to help SAVE AMERICA !!!
Well Elon Musk is a businessman, first of all. He also made his money on his own. So, I can see why he would like Trump, and just maybe Elon is correct that Trump is the best man for the President’s Job. I know things were better under Trump in the State I live in. The article was well written. I actually enjoyed reading it.
FREEDOM TO SPEAK OUT
We are gathered here today
With trust in each other well vested
If we gather elsewhere, even to pray
We know we would all be arrested.
We are gathered at this virtual nook
A solitary dominion called “X”
We strive to stay in line, and by the book
In a quest to come up with a fix.
You see, every thought in town had been thwarted
To make it appear as if we accept our struggles so far
As demonic rats created havoc since this regime started
Humankind fearfully exists in turmoil — we are at war.
We are in collective thoughts forging strength
To weather this menacingly misguided regime
Regulated through this unpleasant labyrinth
Compelled to flee from the evil within.
We are here as one because unity brings fire
A kindle will sustain our faith
Thank you, Elon Musk, for the freedom to aspire
Calling out soul-less Goliaths for each turmoil they create.