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Elon Musk has taken over another popular X handle, this time to support Donald Trump and bash his opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris.
The @America handle was once dormant. But on Saturday, as Musk appeared at a Trump rally in Pennsylvania, the account started tweeting pro-Trump/anti-Harris statements.
Musk's own X profile has since been changed to say: "Read @America to understand why I’m supporting Trump for President."
(Credit: X)The @America account hadn't tweeted since 2020 when it criticized Trump for his COVID response and Musk for his "irresponsible" tweets about the pandemic. It's now been migrated to a new handle, @america123_12, Mashable’s Matt Binder reports.
The @America account is now officially the domain of a political action committee called America PAC, which Musk founded to help Trump turn out votes during the upcoming election. The account has since been encouraging users to register to vote while criticizing Harris.
Musk hasn't been shy about seizing X handles. Last year, when Twitter rebranded as X, the company took over the @X handle from a San Francisco man named Gene X, who had controlled the account for 16 years.
In that case, X could argue it was a business-related decision. Taking @America is obviously political, even though Musk said in 2022 that "For Twitter to deserve public trust, it must be politically neutral." Since then, Musk has become a vocal supporter of Trump and Republican causes amid accusations that X has turned into a funnel for political misinformation.
The decision is not sitting well with some X users. “So the claim from Elon that X would be for both sides was just, BS,” wrote one user on Sunday. “It's a pro-MAGA platform now. Why can't he say it?” Other users are blocking @America from their X timeline.