Elon Musk on Tuesday declared that George Soros ‘hates humanity’, because he backs policies which ‘erode the fabric of civilization’.
Musk, 52, appeared on Joe Rogan’s podcast, with the pair swilling what appeared to be whisky and smoking cigars as they roamed over a broad range of issues over two hours.
The X CEO said he bought Twitter a year ago because he felt it was ‘having a corrosive effect on civilization’, and spreading the ‘woke mind virus’ at a dangerous pace, and condemned COVID restrictions, claiming that people put on ventilators were killed by the ventilators, not the virus.
The pair – Rogan in a blonde wig and Puerto Rico shirt for Halloween; Musk with a silk scarf around his neck – even went out to the parking lot to fire arrows at Musk’s Tesla Cybertruck.
Musk bet Rogan $1 the arrows would not pierce the truck’s sides. Musk won.
Musk repeated his long-running criticism of billionaire financier George Soros, 93, who has for decades backed progressive causes and angered Musk in May by dumping his Tesla stock.
Elon Musk on Tuesday appeared on Joe Rogan’s podcast, smoking a cigar and drinking what looked to be whisky
Soros, born in Budapest, survived the Nazi occupation of Hungary and moved first to Britain, then the United States, where he began his hugely-influential philanthropy.
‘He is I believe the top contributor to the Democratic party,’ Musk told Rogan. ‘The second one was Sam Bankman-Fried.
‘And Soros, he had a very difficult upbringing.
‘In my opinion, he fundamentally hates humanity. That’s my opinion.’
Musk said that he was deeply opposed to Soros’ work backing progressive district attorneys, who pursued policies he saw as soft on crime.
‘He’s doing things that erode the fabric of civilization – getting DAs elected who refuse to prosecute crime,’ said Musk.
‘That’s part of the problem in San Francisco, and LA, and a bunch of other cities.
‘So why would you do that?’
Rogan asked: ‘Is it humanity, or just the United States?’
Musk said it was worldwide.
‘He’s pushing things in other countries as well,’ Musk said.
George Soros, 92, has angered Elon Musk with his progressive policies
Musk told Rogan that he thought Soros was ‘basically a bit senile at this point’ – in June, Soros handed control of the Open Society Foundations and the rest of his $25 billion empire to his 37-year-old son, Alex.
The foundation directs about $1.5 billion a year to groups such as those backing human rights around the world and helping build democracies. Alex Soros said he intends to broaden the foundation’s priorities to include voting and abortion rights as well as gender equity.
Musk said that the elder Soros had been ‘very smart’ in using his money to achieve his goals.
‘He’s very good at arbitrage – famously he shorted the British pound,’ explained Musk. ‘That’s how I think he made his first money.
Arbitrage is spotting value for money that other people don’t see.
‘And one of the things he noticed is that the value for money in local races is much higher than it is in national races.
‘The lowest value for money is a presidential race. Then next lowest value for money is a senate race, then a congress.
‘And when you get to city and state district attorneys the value for money is extremely good.’
Musk said that Soros found he could help push policies he approved of through local officials.
‘Soros realized that you don’t have to actually change the laws,’ said Musk.
‘You just need to change how they are enforced.
‘If nobody chooses to enforce the laws, or the laws are differentially enforced, then its like changing the laws.’
Musk has previously compared Soros to X-Men supervillain Magneto – a character who manipulates the world and thinks mutants should be in charge, rather than humans.
He made the comments on Twitter in May, following the announcement that Soros’ investment fund had dumped all of their Tesla stock.
Elon Musk was interviewed on CNBC and was asked about his remarks about George Soros, giving a bizarre rambling reply
George Soros, a Hungarian-born Billionaire, heads the Open Society Foundation and is a Holocaust survivor. His foundation backs progressive politicians
Musk responded to Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO of the Anti-Defamation League, saying that the South African-born billionaire was not anti-Semitic, but his remarks were dangerous.
‘He’s arguably the most influential person on the planet controlling what’s essentially our public square. When he repeats conspiracy theories, that feeds the extremists,’ said Greenblatt.
Musk replied: ‘In fairness, I must concede that Joel has a good point and I will endeavor to be more thoughtful in the future.’
He later corrected to tweet to say ‘Jonathan’.
Musk continued: ‘Comic book analogies are obviously imperfect, to say the least.
‘Just because George Soros can bend metal using his mind doesn’t mean he’s Magneto!!
‘Anyway, my actual concern with Soros is that he has funded so many politicians & DAs who are soft even on violent crime, which has caused great damage to many cities imo.
‘Also, while I am very much in favor of expanding legal immigration, we must have some vetting of who comes in, so that we do not allow dangerous felons to prey upon innocent Americans.’
The Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs said that Musk’s tweet had resulted in a flood of conspiracy theories and the hashtag ‘The Jews’ to trend on the platform.
Musk, on Tuesday, then discussed the purchase of Twitter, now renamed as X.
Musk spent two hours talking to Rogan for his show
In the year since buying the company for $44 billion, Musk has seen its value plummet to $19 billion.
He laid of more than 6,000 people – about 80 percent of the staff – and took action that riled many users.
He has gutted content moderation, restored accounts of previously banned extremists, and allowed users to purchase account verification, helping them profit from viral – but often inaccurate – posts.
Musk has instead promoted Community Notes, in which X users police the platform, as a tool to combat misinformation.
Musk said that he bought the platform because he wanted to save ‘civilization’.
‘This is going to sound melodramatic but I was worried that it was having a corrosive effect on civilization,’ he told Rogan.
‘Just having a bad impact.’
He said part of the problem was that the company was located in hyper liberal San Francisco, and the flawed policies of the city ‘infected’ the staff.
‘I think part of it is where it’s located – which is downtown San Francisco,’ he said.
‘While I think San Francisco is a beautiful city and we should fight really hard to right the ship of San Francisco.
‘But if you walk around downtown San Francisco, right near the X headquarters, it’s the zombie apocalypse. It’s really rough.’
He asked Rogan if he had been recently: Rogan said he had not.
‘It’s crazy,’ Musk continued. ‘You can’t believe it til you go there.
‘And you have to say: what philosophy led to that outcome.
‘And that philosophy is one which was being piped to earth.
‘So – a philosophy that would ordinarily be quite niche, and quite restrained, so the fallout area was limited, was effectively given as an information weapon.
‘Information technology weapon to propagate what is essentially a mind virus to earth.
‘And the mind virus is very clear if you walk the streets of downtown San Francisco.
‘It is the end of civilization.’
Musk has been vocal in his condemnation of progressive politicians in San Francisco, and called for the most liberal, Dean Preston, to be jailed.
Preston, a member of the Democratic Socialists, has since closed his X account.
Musk is expected to attend a global summit on artificial intelligence in Britain this week, according to a government official.
Britain is bringing together representatives of AI companies, political leaders and experts on November 1-2 to discuss what some see as the risks posed by AI, with an aim of building an international consensus on its safe development.
Around 100 participants will discuss subjects including the unpredictable advances of AI and the potential for humans to lose control of it, according to the agenda.
While several world leaders, including U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris and President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen are due to attend the summit, the full guest list has not been made public.
‘In conversation with @elonmusk after the AI Safety Summit Thursday night on @X,’ tweeted British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak.