Donald Trump Doesn’t Need X—but Elon Musk Desperately Needs Him Back

August 13, 2024:

In the hours leading up to the conversation on X Spaces, this seemed to be the case: Trump posted 10 times on X, his first posts on the platform since August 2023 and his first sustained period of activity since he was notoriously banned from the platform for his part in spreading election conspiracies ahead of the attack on the Capitol on January 6, 2021.

But Trump, who also stayed online for hours after the event, instead returned to Truth Social, the platform he built after being kicked off of X. He shared more than a dozen updates—or “truths”—encouraging followers to go out and vote in primaries in Minnesota and Wisconsin for candidates he was endorsing.

At around 1:20 am on Tuesday morning, hours after the event had wrapped, Trump finally posted a link on Truth Social to a recording of the conversation with Musk. But rather than a link directly to the recording on X, Trump posted a link to a recording of the event from his own YouTube channel. Later, Trump posted another link to the conversation, this time to a recording on video sharing site Rumble.

While Trump has a much larger following on X than Truth Social—90 million versus 7.5 million—there are other considerations to take into account.

Trump owns a 60 percent stake in Trump Media & Technology Group, which owns Truth Social. As part of his deal with the company, he is obligated to post on Truth Social before posting on any other platform, with exceptions for campaign and political content.

The price of TMTG shares also fell on Monday after Trump began posting on X, which could also be a consideration for Trump, given that he has to wait until September 19, when a six-month lockout period expires, before he can sell any of the shares he holds in the company.

Musk knows that keeping Trump happy and on his platform is possibly key to reinvigorating X. But at the end of the day, Musk is still looking out for himself: During the conversation on Monday, right after agreeing with Trump’s takes on electric vehicles and US oil drilling that would appear to directly contradict Musk’s own business interests, Musk proposed that he would take a role in a potential second Trump administration on a “government efficiency body.”

“I’d love it,” Trump said in response.

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