Elon Musk’s time as CEO of Twitter has come to an end. The billionaire announced his formal plans to step down in a tweet on Dec. 20. “I will resign as CEO as soon as I find someone foolish enough to take the job! After that, I will just run the software & servers teams,” his tweet read. The Tesla CEO started running the social media platform after finalizing a deal to buy the company in October.
I will resign as CEO as soon as I find someone foolish enough to take the job! After that, I will just run the software & servers teams.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 21, 2022
Elon’s decision to step down came after he ran a Twitter poll asking whether users on the platform would like him to stay in his position on December 18. “Should I step down as head of Twitter? I will abide by the results of the poll,” he wrote. The poll received over 17.5 million votes, and after it was closed 57.5 percent of participants said that he should give up the position.
Should I step down as head of Twitter? I will abide by the results of this poll.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 18, 2022
The poll was run after the site implemented a policy that would prevent users from posting links to other social platforms. The rule was seemingly reversed after much backlash. “Going forward, there will be a vote for major policy changes. My apologies. Won’t happen again,” Elon tweeted in response to the backlash.
Elon’s tenure as the head of Twitter has been mired in controversy since he acquired the company in October. He suspended a handful of celebrities who changed their display names to “Elon Musk” to troll him. He’s been criticized for reinstating accounts by former President Donald Trump, who was banned following the January 6 attack on the Capitol, and Kanye West, who was suspended for tweeting antisemitic remarks. Musk also temporarily suspended journalists, claiming that they had “doxxed” him, for tweeting out information regarding an account that shared information on Elon’s private jet. Following a poll, he reinstated the accounts.
Truth resonates …
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 12, 2022
He’s also been known to tweet some pretty wild tweets that have gotten a lot of attention and criticism. In early Dec. 2022, he revealed he wanted to prosecute Anthony Fauci, the chief medical adviser to President Biden who has led the U.S. response to the COVID-19 pandemic since it began in early 2020 during the Trump administration. “My pronouns are Prosecute/Fauci,” he tweeted before many users clapped back at him. He also shared a meme that was edited to show Fauci telling Biden, “Just one more lockdown, my king.”
Birds haven’t been real since 1986 pic.twitter.com/lR6BZj0nwX
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 7, 2022
He also claimed birds weren’t “real” in another tweet that was part of a conversation talking about naming Twitter features after birds, back in Nov. 2022. “Birds haven’t been real since 1986,” he wrote in response to another tweet with the same claim. It seemed to reference a conspiracy theory that claims birds are actually robots created by the CIA after they wiped out all the real birds.
Following Elon’s $44 billion purchase, a number of celebrities, including Whoopi Goldberg and Elton John, announced that they would be leaving the platform due to the billionaire’s decisions to allow certain types of speech and misinformation to spread throughout the app. Still, some stayed on the site, even if they were angry about Elon’s purchase, such as actress Alyssa Milano, who said that she wanted to keep the fight to share her views. She said that she’d returned her Tesla after sexual misconduct allegations came out against Elon (which he has denied), but she also explained that he could’ve used the money for the purchase to do something charitable during an interview on The View. “I’m so annoyed with these billionaires, with the exception of a few, but especially Elon Musk. You buy Twitter to destroy it for $40 billion. $40 billion. Elon Musk, imagine if he donated that money to UNICEF. He would change the world. There would be no hunger,” she said.