Half of Britons think that Elon Musk is a threat to British democracy, a new survey has claimed. According to polling from More in Common, the public is hesitant of the tech billionaire’s interventions into British politics, with only 21% saying he understands the concerns of ordinary UK voters.
The X owner has been a fixture in British news this month after defending far-Right activist Tommy Robinson as a “political prisoner” and calling for his release. Musk then called for a new Reform UK leader after Nigel Farage distanced himself from the comments. The two men are due to meet again at the President-elect’s inauguration next week, while Farage insists they are “still friends” and that Musk remains interested in donating to Reform.
But the More in Common figures suggest Musk’s reputation among the British electorate has taken a hit. While 81% believe the SpaceX and Tesla CEO can successfully run a business, only 26% think he would be a good adviser to the UK government and 68% believe he only cares about himself. Opinium polling for the Observer last weekend found that 53% think he is having a negative impact on British politics, while 47% considered his comments on the grooming gangs scandal “unhelpful”.
Britons don’t believe Elon Musk cares about justice for grooming gangs victims |
What do you think is the main reason for Musk commenting on UK grooming gangs? |
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The online feud between Musk and Prime Minister Keir Starmer has been rumbling on since summer last year, when Labour was accused of mishandling the riots which followed the Southport stabbings in July. Having criticised the Government response on social media, Musk was consequently not invited to a UK investment summit. The Labour leader accused the tech mogul of spreading “lies and disinformation” on the grooming gangs scandal after the Tesla CEO said Starmer was “complicit in the rape of Britain” during his time as head of the Crown Prosecution Service.
It is not just Britain which is playing host to conversations about Musk's potential threat to democracy. In France, for example, President Emmanuel Macron said to French ambassadors: "Ten years ago, who could have imagined it if we had been told that the owner of one of the largest social networks [...] would support a new international reactionary movement and intervene directly in elections, including in Germany." But where Starmer clearly thinks his influence is corrosive, Italy’s Giorgia Meloni disagrees. The Italian Prime Minister was asked last week whether she thought the unelected billionaire posed problems for the democratic process. She responded that it was important to distinguish between “interference” and “expressing opinions”, before suggesting that George Soros was more of a threat to democracy than Musk.
Britons see Nigel Farage as more trustworthy than Elon Musk |
For each of the following would you say they apply to (Elon Musk/Nigel Farage)? |
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When Donald Trump returns to the White House next week, Musk will co-head the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) alongside former Republican presidential hopeful Vivek Ramaswamy. It will be an advisory department, not an official arm of the federal government, aimed at dismantling bureaucracy.
Nick Clegg, former deputy prime minister and until recently head of global affairs at Meta, told the BBC last month that Musk could become a “political puppet master”. During the US election campaign, the world’s richest man was the biggest political donor to either main party, giving $277 million to Trump and other Republican candidates. On whether this made Musk a “threat to democracy”, Clegg said: “I think Elon Musk is obviously now playing an outsized role in both the election and now the formation of the new US administration.”
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SubscribeOver half of Britons believe the BBC is a reliable and trustworthy source for news. That’s the real concern.
I’ve been quite shocked by how much more concerned my middle class neighbours are by Musk’s tweets than by the rape and abuse of children in Northern towns. The UK graduate class has completely lost its moral compass.
I have found similar- I find their complacency truly obnoxious.
They are more interested in virtue signalling than the plight of working class girls. They can sing “don’t look back in anger’ and “kum ba ya” with a smug sense of pride about how tolerant they are. A tolerance they can afford because these crimes don’t effect the middle class. Until it does, they will continue to be blind to the damage that is done
More in Common is another name for the Jo Cox Network so no prizes for guessing where its sympathies lie.
Interestingly they have just announced on their website;
‘We’re excited to have received funding for three years (2023-2026) from the National Lottery’s Community Fund to develop and grow the Network.’
I thought Lottery grants were meant to be apolitical??
If More in Common told me that water is wet I’d run the tap to check.
Second item on the agenda after the university closures must be the requirement that all these parasitic NGOs lose taxpayer funding and re-apply for their charitable status. The whole thing has become a monstrous middle class scam.
This isn’t talked about nearly enough.
If someone’s opinion that differs from yours is interpreted as a “threat to democracy” the threat is you, not them.
That is so simpleminded a take that only a shit for brains populist would make.
With virtually the entire civil service, NGOs, London legacy media, education system and criminal justice system permanently staffed and run by people well to the Left in their political priors, how much of a ‘democracy’ do we actually have? Some recent examples of our ‘democracy’: https://grahamcunningham.substack.com/p/carry-on-governing.
Truth is, our vote-Left-get-Left/vote Right-get-Right pluralist electoral democratic ship of state sailed away over the horizon a good while ago now.
I think our current politicians are a bigger threat to our democracy than Musk.
Frankly, I’m a little more worried about the damaging effect on my eyes of repeatedly seeing pictures of his pasty, middle-aged midriff. Put it away, love.
It does match his puffy, middle-aged face.
Is Elon Musk a threat to our bureaucracy ?
Of course he is.
Nicely put. Yes, expect a raft of Musk Anxiety Officer posts to be advertised in the legacy press in the coming months.
Yes, he’s shining a light on the cockroaches that infest Whitehall, the judiciary, the police, and the local councils.
What a complete load of nonsense.
Musk is just one individual amongst tens of millions posting stuff on X. There’s no reason for his views to be taken any more seriously (or literally) than anyone else’s. And if you don’t like it, just don’t read it. The only reason I’ve heard about it is because other people amplified his message – his critics are amongst those actually spreading his views.
The real threats to democracy are a) censorship (which is what many of the critics really want) and b) encouraging the idea that responsible adults can’t think and judge things for themselves. And if you don’t think adults can be trusted, then you’ve no business “protecting democracy” in the first place, since you clearly don’t believe in it.
Well put. The middle class commentariat always needs a bogeyman; the cast of faces may change (Cummings, Boris, Trump, Farage, now Musk) but the abiding feature is that none of them, when asked, can really explain why they have these deep & visceral feelings of hatred – the best explanation you might get is “it’s what they stand for” (as reflected in the breakdown of responses to this poll). Ironically these very same people were quite happy to support censorship in the old Twitter, pontificating “it’s a commercial organisation, they can do what they want”.
In its own way this derangement of the educated middle classes since 2015 is even more astonishing than the weird identity-politics / victimhood obsession of certain parts of the younger generation.
Not having Free Speech limits language. Ideas cannot be expressed.
Language is impoverished. Mistakes are not called out.
What are you left with? Unherd.
Who of you here could write what you truly think about the Pakistani rape gangs?
Not one of you. Who would want to go to prison for saying what they think?
There is no Free Speech in UK.
No one even points out that simple fact.
No one even recognises that simple fact.
But Unheard can waffle on about Musk and a threat to democracy.
Ok l’ll write what I truly think. Scumbags whose culture should never have been allowed into the country and who we should remove from the country if able, imprison after legal process if not.
Why would this trashy news site not want free speech, free opinion?
Only if it were a political tool. In this case of Starmer, who must be protected at all costs, it seems.
I despise you Unherd for not defending open debate.
Cue 5 trolls….
….and yet you’re still here!
The Dems spent $1 billion during the election campaign. The GOP spent $300 million. But ya, the billionaires are lining up for Trump. And somehow the author says Musk donated $277 to his campaign.
Yeah this is why nobody bought into the Harris campaign. The numbers defy logic. It’s even worse in hindsight given the election results. The Democrats had fewer votes than Trump but spent three times as much money. What else can one conclude but that the Democrats were, on average, a great deal richer than their Republican counterparts? One would think it wouldn’t be so difficult to understand that there’s no amount of money spent on advertising that can counteract the plain facts of how much money was spent. Spending more rather makes it worse. The billionaire class has lined up almost to a man against Trump since the word go, and every bit of real evidence shows it. Yet, the Harris campaign had the gall to run ads that said she would “make the billionaires pay”. So that’s why they all gave money to your campaign, because you’d take more of their money in taxes after they already gave you more to win the election. Sure Kamala… Do they think the average voter is incapable of basic logic, connecting spending to more donations from the wealthy, or do they themselves fail to make the logical connection and are truly clueless what’s going on.
I think Steve Bannon recently summed up Musk extremely well.
The half who wouldn’t be able.to differentiate between their a**s & a hole in the ground – They object to Musk
The other half, who can understand his intervention on rape gangs is a welcome shock to a malfunctioning system – appreciate his contributions as a private citizen with influence.
Whilst I do agree with what Musk says, I am uncomfortable with the influence he has.
Many on here correctly complain about Soros poking his nose into foreign countries affairs and made a song and dance about Labour members flying across to work on the Democrat campaign in the States, yet are happy with Musk using his platform for support numerous parties of his choosing throughout Europe.
Personally I’m not happy with any of it, I’m not going to cheer on Musk for doing it while condemning Soros simply because he’s more supportive of my favoured parties/subjects because in my eyes that’s incredibly hypocritical.
The difference is Musk is open…not so Soros…
The poll says ’62 per cent of the public believe far-right terrorism is a serious issue in the UK today’
A poll by who exactly?
I have never read an Unherd article making the case for Free Speech and defending it.
The common idiocy begins ‘I support Free Speech, but…..’
No one calls this out.
There is never any debate about Free Speech. It is a pathetic indictment of the level of public debate.
The ‘Rule of But’. Everything in the speaker’s/writer’s sentence before the word BUT should be ignored.
Free speech is unheard especially in Unherd
Cue 5 trolls.
The threat to majoritarian rule of nearly every country is the emergent oligarchy of of wokeists and bureaucrats. Musk is an easy strawman distraction.
So an opinion poll reflects what people generally hear on the news. Who could possibly have guessed that! Nobel prize for psychology coming up soon.
An opinion poll out out by a corrupt state-dependent NGO is always going to promote the interests of corrupt state-dependent NGOs. If it didn’t, they wouldn’t publish it.
The UK population is largely sheep-like, explaining this year’s super-majority for the worst government in British political history.
A supermajority doesn’t exist in British politics, it’s simply a majority. Labour also won 2/3 of the seats with only 1/3 of the vote.
It’s more a quirk of the UK electoral system than the British electorate being sheep like
Is this a double standard?
When a tech billionaire comments on our politics it’s a threat to democracy.
But when Labour sends 100 advisors to aid the Kamala campaign (with predictably hilarious results) that’s not a threat to their democracy?!
And vice versa on here to be fair. How many times on here have we read complaints about Soros or Labour helping Harris while cheering on Musk for doing the same?
It’s all wrong in my eyes, though I’m not sure how you prevent it
Soros’ motives are sinister and anti-democratic. I’ve yet to be persuaded that Musk’s are the same.
Is that because he favours your favoured side?
How is a billionaire who owns the major social media site openly attacking foreign leaders (even if what he says is correct) not interfering with democracy?
At least Musk openly declares himself. This distinguishes him from previous oligarchs like George Soros, the Koch brothers, Warren Buffett, etc. The donor classes who backed political movements and candidates have always hidden behind political parties, lobbyist groups, and the politicians themselves. It isn’t that hard to figure out who they are, though it bears remembering this wasn’t always the case. It used to be a lot harder to trace political money. Some of that is changes to the law but far more is attributable to the Internet and the diversification of media sources. They can’t hide anymore because somebody will follow the money and put it out on the Internet and it will get circulated on social media for everybody to see.
Musk’s bold move is to simply do openly what the super rich have previously always tried to keep hidden. In a world where one’s political leanings can’t be hidden, it makes no sense to appear to be hiding them. Better to declare them outright and be thought an honest broker than to try and fail to hide them like some covert agent or secret manipulator, the man behind the curtain. Musk has consistently proven himself an innovator and a risk taker in his other ventures, and here again we see his willingness to change his approach and defy convention. I’m not surprised the initial reaction is somewhat negative. Anything that’s new and different is likely to face some criticism early on, and Musk knows that. He is thinking long-term, and that alone makes him able to outmaneuver many of his rivals both in business and politics.
Literally anyone I disagree with is a ‘threat to democracy’…except, what democracy?
Musk is doing great work. A true hero, exposing the blatant ideological hypocrisy of the various leftist regimes that dominate the ‘West’.
Meloni has just gone up even more in my estimation. May we have an opinion poll on Soros as a threat to democracy please?
Means nothing without the provision of a definition for the democracy they are talking about
George Soros is a far greater threat to democracy than Elon Musk.
Musk is way more repulsive on a personal level though.
In the UK we have a far greater threat to democracy and free speech than Elon Musk. He is called Sir Keir Starmer!
He’s heading for a fall, politically at least. Unlike his rockets where tests sometimes mean they blow up as part of the development process he’s going to find politics isn’t like that. You blow yourself up and never recover credibility.
In US the disagreement with Steve Bannon and elements of MAGA is visceral and turned even nastier over the weekend. Trump sitting to one side for the moment, perhaps waiting to see if Elon’s money can exert leverage on Senators and House Reps he needs to have any chance of his agenda progressing in 25. But lots of them hate him too and seeing how MAGA reacting. He’s shown he’s clueless about government (apparently he didn’t have first idea about Reconciliation and how that works, nor even some basic differences between Senate and House). DOGE is an albatross cunningly placed round his neck so when Trump distances himself Elon also gets the blame for the need to raise the debt ceiling.
UK public reacting in exactly the way we’d expect. In a week or so he’s gone from the potential biggest asset for Reform to it’s greatest liability. That takes some doing that, but deciding Yaxley-Lennon your North Star on where the British public are showed both his and his advisors stupidity when not building rockets or cars.
In the US the demographic that has increased the most in recent years is…Billionaires – five-fold. That realisation going to grab more and more of the US public whilst many can’t get secure employment or reliable healthcare and whilst they see Billionaire tax cuts get prioritisation. And this Chump of Trump wants to have influence here? Too many of us are too wise. He’s turned himself toxic.
I fear we need to add Musk Derangement Synrome to your diagnosis !
I really think it’s worth what in electronics we call “low pass filtering” some of this stuff – that is to increase your sampling period from several times per day to once a fortnight. It cuts out a lot of the noise (from tracking all the latest outbursts, reaction and instapolls). And we really are commenting on noise most of the time here.
Consider that most people will be commenting on a news report based on someone reacting to an online message which in turn reacts to an original Musk message which reacted to someone else’s original post. Almost any context or understanding is lost after all the information loss/distortion at each interface. And any instapoll will be measuring a short term reaction rather than any considered, lasting opinion. Almost certainly measuring noise then.
I’m starting to think that Musk is using a similar technique to Trump – over-reaching what he says for effect and to provoke reactions. Best taken seriously (when it is serious), but not always literally. Musk is certainly serious about self-driving cars. But taking his forecasts literally on when they’ll be available has been unwise.
Let’s see what happens PB. The House Reconciliation process going to be v interesting on Trump priorities and what Republicans really think DOGE will deliver. And Bannon isn’t backing down on how he and an increasing number of MAGA see Elon.
I sense the Trump ‘believers’ find these realities uncomfortable but with Office comes responsibility for choices.
I had a feeling I could find a post from you at the very bottom. I’m sure in your mind, your poor vote ratios are due to being a free-thinker.
But could it be that you’re unaware of your own bias and just saying different varieties of the same thing in almost every post. We get it, everything in the world is the fault of the malign “Right Wing Oligarchy.” So even though many more billionaires clearly fund the Left than the Right, those on the Left should be ignored because those are the “good billionaires.”
Perhaps ‘Watson’ and ‘Richard Littlewood’ could be tempted into an interminable argument that the rest of us could observe from afar (several light years).
Yes that was a possibility until apparent d**k wasn’t well. Thanks for your concern though, appreciated.
Do you really think I worry about Votes TB? Hey I’m not here for confirmatory bias am I.
Anyway on the Oligarch theme, it increasingly looks like Steve Bannon of similar view. Uncomfortable for you I can tell.
If Unherd lived up to its name and Mission Statement it would actively support free speech and diversity of opinion.
It doesn’t.
Unherd is a lie.
If you don’t like it here, why not spend your time somewhere you like better doing something more productive ?
Isn’t this getting as tiresome for you – repeating this message to an audience that is stubbornly unreceptive to your wisdom – as it is for us ?
The level of political debate in UK is pathetic. Politicians are responsible for this and the media.
Then why not do something constructive to raise it ?
UnHerd do welcome people to offer contributions. Have you tried ?
The media’s narrative is a blight on UK.
I don’t think they will be too keen to publish someone saying that.
My guess is that Richard Littlewood is a ‘bot. Treat accordingly.