Brazil’s top court orders suspension of Elon Musk’s X amid fight over accounts

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Brazil’s Supreme Court has ordered the suspension of Elon Musk’s X in a sharp escalation in the feud between the billionaire and the top court in Latin America’s largest nation.

Justice Alexandre de Moraes on Friday gave regulators 24 hours to shut down access to X in Brazil. The move is likely to inflame public opinion — more than 20mn Brazilians use the platform regularly.

De Moraes also ruled that any individual or company that uses means such as a virtual private network to navigate around the block would be subject to daily fines of about $8,000.

“Free speech is the bedrock of democracy and an unelected pseudo-judge in Brazil is destroying it for political purposes,” Musk posted on X after the decision was announced.

The order to ban the site is the latest twist in an acrimonious row between Musk and de Moraes over X accounts believed to be linked to far-right and opposition figures.

Musk, a self-declared free speech absolutist, has criticised de Moraes over what he has cast as censorship requests to remove or suspend some accounts. The justice has argued the moves are part of a fight to protect democracy from misinformation and hateful content.

X closed its Brazil office earlier this month, stating it had received a “secret order” from de Moraes insisting the platform take down certain accounts or its legal representative in the country would face a fine or arrest.

De Moraes on Wednesday gave the company a day to name a new legal representative in the country or else be shut down. On Thursday the social media group said it expected it would soon no longer be available to users in the country “simply because we would not comply with his illegal orders to censor his political opponents”.

X also said that after its legal representative resigned, de Moraes froze her bank accounts. “Our challenges against his manifestly illegal actions were either dismissed or ignored,” X wrote.

Randolfe Rodrigues, a senator and the government’s leader in Congress, rebuked Musk, saying: “The rule is clear. If all Brazilians and all companies based in Brazil have to comply with the law, why shouldn’t Musk?”

“On one hand, it gives a clear message that law must be respected in the country. This is a simple question of asserting national sovereignty. On other hand, the way this has been done by de Moraes was not necessarily the best,” said Luca Belli, a professor at the Getulio Vargas Foundation law school in Rio de Janeiro, citing the “questionable” order to apply fines to users of VPNs.

Musk has exacerbated the row by poking fun at de Moraes online. On Wednesday he shared a picture of the judge behind bars, which appeared to have been generated by artificial intelligence, with the caption: “One day, @Alexandre, this picture of you in prison will be real. Mark my words.” 

De Moraes has spearheaded a judicial crackdown against online disinformation but is a controversial figure who divides opinion in Brazil.

Supporters say he helped secure democracy in the face of attacks on the reliability of the country’s electronic voting system by former president Jair Bolsonaro in the 2022 polls. However, Bolsonaro’s rightwing followers have alleged the judge curbed freedom of expression and unfairly targeted conservatives.  

A ban on X would place Brazil among a group of autocratic nations, such as North Korea and Venezuela, that also prohibit the platform.

President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has repeatedly sought to cast Musk as an out-of-touch billionaire. “There is clearly a far-right articulation in the world. [Musk] might be a piece of it,” Luís Roberto Barroso, the current president of the Supreme Court, told the Financial Times in May. “Some people invoke freedom of expression when truly they are defending a business model based on engagement and, unfortunately, hatred, sensationalism [and] conspiracy theories.”

Separately on Thursday, Starlink, Musk’s satellite network, posted that it had received an order from de Moraes earlier this week freezing its finances and blocking it from conducting financial transactions in Brazil.

Local press have reported that the decision to block Starlink accounts in Brazil was part of an attempt to collect fines levied on X for failing to comply with court orders.

Musk, who also runs Tesla and SpaceX, has increasingly weighed in on foreign politics through the platform he bought for $44bn, championing rightwing politicians globally while attacking leftwing leaders. 

Earlier this month, he criticised the UK prime minister, Sir Keir Starmer, for his handling of anti-immigrant rioting and started a war of words with Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro. He also interviewed Donald Trump, the former US president and current Republican candidate, on the platform. 

The ban also comes days after Russia-born Telegram founder Pavel Durov, another social platform chief executive who has opted for a hands-off approach to moderation, faced preliminary charges in France after being unexpectedly arrested for alleged complicity in criminal activity hosted on his app. 

The stance of both tech executives has prompted global debate over the extent to which social media platforms should prioritise freedom of expression over online safety. 

Additional reporting by Beatriz Langella