Elon Musk giving Reform $100m

Elon Musk + Reform will not be troubled by what is allowable, nor what is moral.

Elon Musk should keep out of politics and stick to what he knows, rockets!

Reform is not a political party but a company.

Musk is trying to interfere in U.K. politics - big time.

We all know the Brexit vote was influenced from beyond our borders. But nothing like this

www.thelondoneconomic.com/news/musk-could-sidestep-overseas-donation-laws-by-donating-to-farage-through-uk-branch-of-x-386620/

he of course infuenced the recent USA election with vast amounths of money.

This is truly anti-democratic and scary.

Time for legislation about gifts to political parties from non Uk citizens. I'm sure Reform, being a PLC will know the dodges but it's completely wrong to let this power hungry and divisive trouble -stirring man get involved in UK politics. Has to be stopped.

We know Elon Musk is a meddler in politics and he can be monitored to a certain extent.

How many other billionaires stay below the parapet and influence?…

My first thought about Musk was why would he be interested in someone like Trump and then of course the penny dropped. It will soon be Elon Musk for President.

Do you think this is true, though? The jury’s out as far as I can believe this.

Musk cant be president he was not born in the US.

That aside, I think foreign donations for political reasons should be banned outright.

If it’s true that Reform is a company, is that a way to avoid the regulations we do have on political donations?.

Why did they have to make it public? If he had quietly handed over the money, there would have been no problem. Instead, he has to turn it into a publicity stunt.

David49

Musk cant be president he was not born in the US.

That aside, I think foreign donations for political reasons should be banned outright.

If it’s true that Reform is a company, is that a way to avoid the regulations we do have on political donations?.

Reform is a company so that 'members' can be excluded from having any say in how the party is run and, of course, how the money is spent.

mum2three

Why did they have to make it public? If he had quietly handed over the money, there would have been no problem. Instead, he has to turn it into a publicity stunt.

Is that how you think a democracy should be run?

The richest man in the world quietly handing over money to a political party in a country in which he was neither born, nor lives in?

What does the man who has everything buy for Xmas?
Obviously a stake in the politics of another country.
🤔

I’ve put this post on another thread but I’m also posting it here, as it’s relevant to this thread too

“And the enormous amount of money spent on 'dark adverts', on Social Media, targeted to those considered most receptive to them (and which no-one else saw) in the run up to Brexit”

That’s right MaizieD.

Listening to the The Secret Agents podcast on the Musk ‘donation’ issue, they are taking it really seriously. The Secret Agents are reputable, experienced political journalists, not given to hyperbole and conspiracy theory.

Their opinion is that (if the donation does happen) the money will likely be spent in a similar way e.g. purchasing and analysing enormous amounts of data on millions of people, who will then be digitally targeted according to sophisticated demographics etc.

In other words ‘brainwashed’ ahead of the next election. That’s why any donation will be made sooner rather than later - allowing 4 years to drip feed the Reform PLC message into people’s psyche in a highly targeted, unregulated, insidious manner.

It worked with Brexit - Farage has form on this approach. Who better to help him this time but the world’s richest man / social media mogul!

What exactly are they able to do with it? Election campaigns are not big, expensive, flamboyant affairs in the UK like they are in the US and anyway, there isn't an election to campaign for at the moment.

Perhaps I'm being naive, but t looks to me like Musk doesn't really have any idea how things work this side of the Atlantic.

And yes, I was wondering if EM is even eligible to be President.

I think you could be right LizzieDrip. My guess would be that the money would be spent on social media and slicker marketing of policies. It could be that Reform increases the number of MPs in the next election.

Nevertheless, it takes longer than four years to build a political party. Reform has a ragbag crew of MPs, who don't seem to have been properly vetted. It needs to build up teams who can work together towards a common goal, which they don't have at the moment. Everything is centred round Farage (and Tice) and whoever will form an alliance with them. They're always falling out - I suspect because there's a collision of egos.

Sooner or later, I think people will see that Reform is about people with strong ideologies who really don't care two hoots about the people they claim to represent. They're out for themselves. Votes for them are merely tools to achieve what they want. It will be interesting to see how Clacton votes in four years. Will they be convinced they have an MP who has fought hard for them and represented them in parliament?

JackyB the money would likely be used as described in my post above. It won’t be used in the traditional way of leaflets etc - that’s gone!

Also, the donation from Musk wouldn’t be used during an election campaign, as there is a cap on that - it would be used years before the next election.

Here’s just one link showing how digital targeting was used during the Brexit referendum:
www.parliament.uk/globalassets/documents/commons-committees/culture-media-and-sport/Fake_news_evidence/Vote-Leave-50-Million-Ads.pdf

If you google Dark Adverts during Brexit I think you’ll be amazed (and possibly a little bit afraid)!

M0nica

David49

Musk cant be president he was not born in the US.

That aside, I think foreign donations for political reasons should be banned outright.

If it’s true that Reform is a company, is that a way to avoid the regulations we do have on political donations?.

Reform is a company so that 'members' can be excluded from having any say in how the party is run and, of course, how the money is spent.

Maybe, but those who support Reform seem a pretty right wing lot to me

“ Perhaps I'm being naive, but t looks to me like Musk doesn't really have any idea how things work this side of the Atlantic.”

Don’t underestimate Musk, in any case are we much different?
if you repeat a message often enough it becomes fact in voters minds. They have 4 yrs now to manipulate voters, judging by the current Labour actions they won’t have to invent much to have a big influence.

Yes, I am cynical !.

Yes, any "Musk money" will be spent on US style Reform propaganda and targeting/recruiting people /presenting Reform more "Acceptably" despite its total lack of democracy within it.
It's about how he uses X as well to attack.

At the moment it does seem like Reform is a one man show and Farage in the past has always fallen out with key players.

Labour is looking to cap political donations. It was in their manifesto.

(The story was in yesterday's paper, but, bizarrely, I can't find a link to it. It was in other papers, too)

No more political funding from private sources, and instead, allocate say £100-200 million in public funds for election campaigning? It’s a safer and fairer approach to ensure transparency and equity - a price surely worth paying for democracy compared to everything else we waste public purse on?

It was in the Independent, just googled

'Labour’s manifesto vowed to “protect democracy by strengthening the rules around donations to political parties”, with a key part being to crack down on foreign interference in Britain’s electoral process. A government source played down suggestions the government was considering a cap on donations but said it would set out further details later in the parliament."

I didnt hit a paywall www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/labour-donation-starmer-elon-musk-b2657801.html

Later in parliament might be too late! For all we know Farage may have trousered it already...🙄

It's really worth seeing the perspective. Just looked up as an example top recent spending was 16 million by Conservatives in 2019 on the actual election, Labour 9 million last election, and we are considering these too "high" in a democracy.

Musk is offering 75 million pounds (100 mill dollars) for now - we just cant go down this US road without losing much that is precious to us.