The X factor: How Trump ally Elon Musk is using social media to prime voter mistrust ahead of 2024 election

Elon Musk has used the social media platform he owns to amass nearly 3.3 billion views on X by fueling doubts about election security issues since January this year — making the tech mogul one of the most viral voices on elections during the 2024 campaign, a CBS News investigation has found.

Musk has frequently shared conspiratorial narratives that have been vexing to public officials who are trying to maintain Americans' confidence in the election in the face of a barrage of misinformation and disinformation. 

At his first solo appearance at a pro-Trump rally in Philadelphia last week, Musk claimed, "Statistically there are some very strange things that happen that are statistically incredibly unlikely." He then repeated debunked claims about the validity of vote tallies produced by Dominion voting machines. But even before he took the stage, Musk had already emerged as a prolific conduit for election misinformation on X, formerly known as Twitter.