Elon Musk is open to the idea of selling Twitter, but only if he was sure the person taking over “would vigorously pursue the truth.”
Musk made the statement in a BBC interview conducted on Twitter Spaces last night. He was asked whether he would sell Twitter if someone offered him $44 billion for the social media platform, the original amount he paid for the company. At first, Musk said he’d refuse the offer. But then he added: “Well, I take things back, it depends on who.”
“I suppose if I were confident they would vigorously pursue the truth, then I guess I would be glad to hand it over to someone else,” Musk said. “I don’t care about the money, really, but I do want to have some source of truth that I can count on.”
In other words, Musk wants to ensure Twitter will stick with the policies he’s enacted since taking over. This includes prioritizing free speech over content moderation, while re-platforming users previously banned from the service, such as former US President Donald Trump.
BBC reporter James Clayton then asked, “If you don’t care about the money, you could just give it to someone that you think is a good person to run Twitter.”
However, Musk deflected and asked: “Who do you think that might be?”
Clayton then later said: “Who could run Twitter? Honestly, I have no idea.”
Musk then retorted: “Yeah, it’s a hard job.”
Musk took over as CEO about six months ago, and since then he’s made numerous controversial changes, including laying off most of the staff. During the interview, Musk revealed Twitter only has around 1,500 staffers, down 80% from the 7,800 employees the company once had.
“This hasn’t been some sort of party,” Musk said. “So it’s been really quite a stressful situation.“
Musk has promised to eventually step down as CEO of Twitter, possibly by year’s end. But during the BBC interview, he revealed there’s still no successor on the horizon. “Not yet, hopefully at some point,” he said.