At town halls, Elon Musk works to harness his celebrity to boost Trump
On Sunday night, billionaire Elon Musk, in a pitch-black Make America Great Again hat, took the stage at Madison Square Garden to introduce former President Donald Trump to a packed audience of MAGA supporters.
"I'm not just MAGA, I'm dark Gothic MAGA," Musk said, drawing applause.
Twenty-four hours earlier, Musk was in Pennsylvania, speaking to over 1,200 voters at a packed town hall organized by his political action committee, America PAC, where fans from around the state came to see the tech titan who has thrown his support -- and millions of dollars -- behind Trump's presidential campaign.
Musk, appearing without Trump, spent nearly three hours fielding questions from supporters who asked the billionaire everything from advice on how to raise their daughters to how he would fix the United States educational system. And while Saturday's town hall may have been aimed at helping boost Trump's chances in the state, it was clear throughout the night why many of the attendees came out.
"Elon Musk -- I mean, he's my hero," Austin, a 29-year-old electrician from Lancaster, Pennsylvania, told ABC News. "I'm mainly here to see him."
A 'national treasure'
In the lead-up to Election Day, Musk has embarked on an unprecedented effort to help Trump win the election -- investing millions from his vast fortune into America PAC, which is saturating key battleground states with ads while spearheading Trump's field operations. But the world's richest man is also hoping to help Trump by harnessing his power as an influencer -- a strategy that has been on display at the series of town halls he's been holding around the state.
For Musk diehards like Austin, it might be working.
"I probably wouldn't be willing to come out to the event," Austin said when asked if he would have attended just for the political content. "I don't think I care enough to come to an event -- but with Elon Musk here, absolutely."
Many of the questions at Saturday's town hall focused on issues facing the country, but attendees often turned their focus to Musk himself, with fans heaping praise on the billionaire and using their time to ask for personal advice -- or even pitch Musk on a business opportunity.
A man from West Chester, Pennsylvania, asked Musk if his Neuralink brain-computer interface could heal his friend with spina bifida and help him walk again. One attendee shared with Musk that he'd named his three-year-old son after him and asked for an autograph to give him when he's older. Another attendee asked Musk for parenting advice on how to better inspire his daughter's interest in science and space.
Throughout the evening, supporters praised Musk as a "national treasure," an "American patriot," and "absolutely brilliant."
The most contentious moment of the night came when a young attendee asked Musk what he would say to voters concerned about Trump's refusal to accept the 2020 election results, and his role in the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol.
"You're an idiot," one person in the crowd shouted when the question was asked, and others in the crowd booed.
While Musk said it was a "fair decision," the billionaire went on to downplay the violent attack on the Capitol and pushed unfounded claims of "voter irregularities," claiming that those who went to the Capitol had "some merit."
Musk said the Jan. 6 attack was "in no way a violent insurrection."
"I disagree with the level of protest, but it's, it was in no way a violent insurrection," Musk said of the attack, in which the Department of Justice said over 140 police officers were assaulted and over 160 rioters later pleaded guilty to assaulting law enforcement.
'A heck of a coincidence?'
Throughout his numerous town halls in the state, Musk, who has over 200 million followers on his social media platform X, has also repeatedly pushed misinformation surrounding the election or previous election cycles.
While appearing at an event in Folsom, Pennsylvania, Musk repeated a debunked conspiracy theory that voting machines had rigged the 2020 election.
"There's always a sort of question of like, say, the Dominion voting machines. It is weird that the, you know, I think they're used in Philadelphia and in Maricopa County, but not in a lot of other places," Musk told the swing state crowd. "Doesn't that seem like a heck of a coincidence?"
A Dominion spokesperson refuted Musk's comments in a statement following the town hall, saying that the company doesn't operate in Philadelphia.
"Fact: Dominion does not serve Philadelphia County. Fact: Dominion's voting systems are already based on voter verified paper ballots. Fact: Hand counts and audits of such paper ballots have repeatedly proven that Dominion machines produce accurate results. These are not matters of opinion. They are verifiable facts," said the spokesperson for Dominion, which last year reached a $787 million settlement with Fox News after it sued the network for making similar unfounded claims.
On the website of Maricopa County, officials also stated that voting machines in the 2020 election were accurate, writing that a hand count after the election "found zero variances between hand count results and the Dominion tabulation equipment."
Beyond the town halls, Musk -- though his America PAC -- has been holding a series of $1 million giveaways for registered voters. Every day until Election Day, Musk's group has pledged to award $1 million to a randomly chosen registered voter from a swing state who agrees to sign a petition supporting the First and Second amendments.
The lottery quickly sparked controversy, and on Monday, after Musk had given away his eighth million-dollar check, the Philadelphia district attorney sued Musk and his super PAC over the giveaway.
When asked for comment, a representative for America PAC pointed ABC News to a post on X announcing Monday's $1 million giveaway winner, which was published after news of the lawsuit broke. The winner on Monday was from Michigan, according to the post
'I think that resonates'
For many of Trump's die-hard fans at Saturday's town hall, Musk helped solidify their support.
Van Moore, a 39-year-old safety director from Lampeter, Pennsylvania, told ABC News that he's voted for Trump since 2016 -- but that he still likes seeing someone who isn't completely in lockstep with the former president.
"Elon Musk isn't 100% aligned with all of the issues, I would say, with former President Trump, but I do think that they are aligned on a lot of key issues, and I think that resonates, obviously, with people here," Moore said.
Others are hoping the enthusiasm from Musk spreads to those who aren't as supportive of Trump.
"I think he's bringing a lot of people who still are undecided, who maybe want to hear what he has to say, and his insight, and have an open conversation," one attendee said. "I'm hoping."
