The White Home has condemned Elon Musk for tweeting “nobody is even making an attempt to assassinate Biden/Kamala” in response to an X person asking “Why they need to kill Donald Trump?”
The president’s workplace issued an announcement Monday criticizing the “irresponsible” publish, which was accompanied by an emoji face with a raised eyebrow. The White Home mentioned: “Violence ought to solely be condemned, by no means inspired or joked about. This rhetoric is irresponsible.” The assertion added that there must be “no place for political violence or for any violence ever in our nation”.
The Secret Service additionally mentioned on Monday it was conscious of a publish by the billionaire on the X social community. Musk, who owns the platform, previously generally known as Twitter, made the publish after a person suspected of planning to assassinate Donald Trump at his golf course in West Palm Seashore was arrested on Sunday.
Musk, himself a Trump supporter, was shortly criticized by X customers from the left and proper, who mentioned they had been involved his phrases to his practically 200m X followers may incite violence towards Biden and Harris.
The tech billionaire deleted the publish however not earlier than the Secret Service, tasked with defending present and former presidents, vice-presidents and different notable officers, took discover.
“The Secret Service is conscious of the social media publish made by Elon Musk and as a matter of observe, we don’t touch upon issues involving protecting intelligence,” a spokesperson mentioned in an e-mail. “We are able to say, nonetheless, that the Secret Service investigates all threats associated to our protectees.”
The spokesperson declined to specify whether or not the company had reached out to Musk, who appeared to counsel in follow-up posts that he had been making a joke.
“Nicely, one lesson I’ve realized is that simply because I say one thing to a gaggle they usually snort doesn’t imply it’s going to be all that hilarious as a publish on X,” he later wrote. “Seems that jokes are WAY much less humorous if individuals don’t know the context and the supply is apparent textual content.”
Harris, a Democrat working towards the Republican nominee Trump within the 2024 election, and Biden each issued statements on Sunday evening expressing aid that Trump had not been harmed.
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This text was amended on 16 September 2024. An earlier model said that Elon Musk had tweeted “Why they need to kill Donald Trump?” It was later corrected to clarify he was replying to that tweet.