Brazil’s president says he refuses be cowed by the wealth and power of tech tycoon Elon Musk, after the politician backed a ban of Musk’s social media site X in his nation.
The site formerly known as Twitter has been barred by one of the world’s largest democracies after accounts on the platform were accused of spreading hate speech and fake news.
Musk, a self-proclaimed free speech absolutist, has since then shut down operations in Brazil and engaged in a war of words with the country’s top legislators and politicians.
In an interview released Monday, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva said his country’s stand against Musk—the richest person on the planet worth $239 billion per the Bloomberg Billionaires Index—should be an example to the rest of the world.
“The world is not obliged to put up with Musk’s far-right ideology just because he is rich,” Lula said in the interview with CNN Brasil.
It’s a stance Lula has firmly taken previously. Last week he told local media, “Just because the guy has a lot of money doesn’t mean he can disrespect this [country].
“He is a citizen of America, he is not a citizen of the world. He cannot keep offending the presidents, the deputies, the senate, the Supreme Court…he has to respect the decision of the Supreme Court.”
Perhaps unsurprisingly, Musk’s rebuttal to the ban spearheaded by Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes has been cutting.
Following a court order to name a legal representative in Brazil, Musk posted an apparently AI-generated image of a bald man in black robes behind bars—seeming to depict Moraes.
“One day, Alexandre, this picture of you in prison will be real. Mark my words,” Musk wrote alongside the image.
Musk has been backed by some fellow heavy hitters from the business world, namely Pershing Square founder and CEO Bill Ackman.
Ackman, a billionaire entrepreneur who invested in X, claimed the move to block the site and freeze the accounts of Musk-led rocket company Starlink “put Brazil on a rapid path to becoming an uninvestable market.”
In the interview last week Lula said his country would not be “scared” of the Tesla CEO or his threats, adding: “This guy has to accept the rules of this country, and if this country made a decision through the Supreme Court he has to accept it.”
X did not immediately respond to Fortune’s request for comment.
A global example
Yesterday the five members of Brazil’s Supreme Court unanimously confirmed the order and supported a fine for those attempting to access the site via a virtual private network (VPN).
The move has reportedly impacted some 20 million users in Brazil, with Musk lambasting the government as an “oppressive regime…afraid of people learning the truth.”
This isn’t the first time Musk, in his self-proclaimed pursuit of freedom of speech, has come up against democratic bodies accusing him of allowing disinformation to run amok on the platform.
Earlier this year the European Union charged X with failing to comply with social media law, meaning it could be facing an eye-watering fine under the body’s Digital Services Act (DSA).
The DSA is a law designed to clamp down on toxic and illegal online content and algorithms.
Again, Musk had a rebuttal to these accusations. He posted on X: “The European Commission offered X an illegal secret deal: if we quietly censored speech without telling anyone, they would not fine us.
“The other platforms accepted that deal. X did not.”
While Lula may be hoping Brazil’s firm stance against X may prove inspirational for other nations, whether they will follow suit and impose an all-out ban on the platform remains to be seen.
