Elon Musk’s pro-Trump group does not choose the winners of its $1 million-a-day giveaway to registered voters at random, but instead picks people who would be good spokespeople for its agenda, a lawyer for the billionaire said on Monday.

“There is no prize to be won, instead recipients must fulfill contractual obligations to serve as a spokesperson for the PAC,” Gober said in the hearing before Judge Angelo Foglietta, referring to Musk’s political action committee, known as America PAC.

  • Ledivin@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    6
    arrow-down
    5
    ·
    14 days ago

    pays or offers to pay or accepts payment either for registration to vote or for voting

    When even the Supreme Court Justices do not have ethics requirements, this is a conplete legal dead-end. Nobody was ever offered anything to register or to vote. Requiring that people are registered to enter is scummy and questionably-ethical, absolutely, but there is no law that actually links these things together, and no judge will convict him of any crime for this.

    Musk has done plenty of things that are clear campaign finance violations or election interference, focus on those things.

    • Makeitstop@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      6
      ·
      14 days ago

      Lotteries are specifically called out as illegal when used to incentivize voting or voter registration. By making a lottery only for registered voters, he is violating that law. The petition is a smoke screen, but it doesn’t actually negate the fact that this is a lottery for registered voters.

      That’s why they switched to saying they were sponsors, they were trying to avoid lottery regulations. Unfortunately for them, you can’t make it legal retroactively by changing your story.

      • Nightwingdragon@lemmy.world
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        ·
        14 days ago

        Unfortunately for them, you can’t make it legal retroactively by changing your story.

        gestures broadly at Trump’s entire presidency

        Uh…wanna bet?

        • dragontamer@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          English
          arrow-up
          2
          ·
          edit-2
          14 days ago

          Gestures at Twitter.com.

          Remember how Elon lost a court case and was forced by contracts to buy Twitter?

          This isn’t Trump. This is an Elon Musk situation. The law can, and will, fuck Elon over. The doofus isn’t anywhere as slippery as Trump.