Sen. Ted Cruz praised on Monday the prospect of Telsa CEO Elon Musk buying Twitter.
The Texas Republican wrote in a tweet that "Twitter openly censors speech based on political ideologies and makes a mockery of our Constitutional liberties. If Elon Musk can turn that around to actually protect free speech and encourage open discourse, Twitter’s full potential will be unlocked."
Cruz sent out the tweet as sources familiar with the negotiations indicated that Twitter is poised to agree to a sale to Musk for about $43 billion in cash.
Musk, reportedly the world’s richest person and a prolific Twitter user, has said the company has to be taken private in order to grow and become a genuine instrument to promote free speech.
Musk on Monday emphasized that he hopes even his "worst critics" will remain on Twitter if he buys it, because "that is what free speech means," Bloomberg reported.
He also said last week that if he does take over Twitter, his biggest promise is to transform it into a platform for free speech with few restrictions, which he said he considers as "essential to a functioning democracy."
But Bloomberg also pointed out that Musk is sensitive to criticism and has a track record of demonstrating little tolerance for speech that is not favorable to him or his companies, or which reflects employee criticism of the workplace.
Brian Freeman ✉
Brian Freeman, a Newsmax writer based in Israel, has more than three decades writing and editing about culture and politics for newspapers, online and television.
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