The Elon Musk–backed America PAC has spent thousands of dollars advertising on the Elon Musk–owned social media platform X to support former president Donald Trump’s campaign. According to X’s political ad disclosure data, between July 8 and October 1 the America PAC ran 59 ads, costing more than $166,000 and yielding, per X’s metrics, 32,058,424 impressions. All of the ads targeted swing states: Georgia, Nevada, Pennsylvania, Michigan, Arizona, and Wisconsin.
Musk first endorsed Trump immediately following the attempted assassination against the former president in July in Butler, Pennsylvania. Since then, Musk has said he is “all in” on his support for Trump, and appeared at a second rally in Butler earlier this month. “This election is the most important election of our lifetime,” said Musk at the time. “This is no ordinary election.” It was one part of Musk’s—and the America PAC’s—efforts to turn out voters for Trump in swing states.
The America PAC has been a driving force behind voter mobilization for the Trump campaign, developing an app to help canvassers target likely voters. (The effectiveness of this strategy remains to be seen, with canvassers reportedly faking voter contacts at scale.) The PAC has offered $47 to any swing state voters who would agree to sign a petition supporting the First and Second Amendments. Musk has also said he will give out $1 million a day to voters who sign the petition, in a move election law expert Rick Hasen described as “clearly illegal.”
Federal Election Commission filings released last week revealed that Musk has funneled $75 million into the PAC since July, dwarfing other Silicon Valley donors who back the former president. Musk has also donated to the Building America’s Future PAC, which has run anti–Kamala Harris ads aiming to dissuade Black and Muslim voters, particularly in swing states.
Musk has also used his ownership of X to further promote Trump. In August, Musk sat down with Trump for an interview hosted on X Spaces. He has also promoted and reshared conspiracy theories pedaled by the Trump campaign, including by alleging that the Democratic Party would allow undocumented immigrants to vote in order to win the election.
In one ad that ran between September 27 and October 1, the post read, “Georgia is filling up with illegal immigrants: In just 3 years, Kamala released more illegal immigrants into our country than almost 3x the population of Atlanta. End Kamala’s Border Chaos and request your ballot for President Trump today.” The ad links to the website votesafe.org, which is paid for by the America PAC and where voters can look up their voter registration status and request ballots.
All of the PAC’s ads are linked to the @theamericapac X account, which links to the PAC’s website. Before his appearance at Trump’s October rally in Butler, Musk had appropriated the @america handle for the America PAC.
The America PAC has also invested heavily in ads on Meta’s platforms, Facebook and Instagram, running more than 250 ads in October alone.
A representative from X did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
—————————————————-