After fantasizing about buying MSNBC and installing Alex Jones on the liberal media network, Elon Musk inserted himself into a legal battle to try to block The Onion from obtaining any X accounts belonging to the bankrupt conspiracy theorist.
On Monday, attorneys for X — which Musk owns — filed a narrow objection to the sale of InfoWars that would prevent the satirical news outlet from taking ownership of Jones’s accounts on the social media platform.
X’s terms of service “make clear that it owns the X Accounts” and that X “merely grants its users a non-exclusive license to use their accounts,” attorneys for the company wrote in a federal bankruptcy court filing in Texas.
“X Corp. is compelled to file this Objection to make clear that X Corp. does not consent to the sale or any other transfer of the non-assignable X Accounts, which in turn, means the X Accounts cannot be sold or transferred at this time,” attorneys argued.
Jones’s accounts “may not be sold, assigned, or otherwise transferred as part of the Sale nor can any X account, including any maintained personally by Jones, including the Jones X Account, be sold to any third party,” they wrote.
Days earlier, Donald Trump Jr. joked that Musk should buy MSNBC, to which the world’s wealthiest man replied, “How much does it cost?”
Right-wing media figures have been frothing over the prospect of MSNBC’s parent company Comcast spinning off its cable networks, including MSNBC and CNBC, with podcaster Joe Rogan vying for Rachel Maddow’s job.
Musk then shared an image on X of a soldier labeled Elon Musk, dropping a grenade labeled Alex Jones, into a hole named MSNBC. Jones also jokingly congratulated Musk for “officially” buying MSNBC.
The Onion and families of Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting victims announced the purchase of InfoWars properties earlier this month — years after Sandy Hook families sued Jones for defamation for calling the massacre a hoax.
A massive defamation verdict prompted Jones to file for bankruptcy; he faced a $1.5 billion defamation judgment related to his statements about the 2012 massacre, in which a gunman fatally shot 26 people, including children between six and seven years old.
Following The Onion’s winning bid, Jones filed a complaint to challenge the sale, alleging a “conspiratorial negotiation and agreement” involving the court’s bankruptcy trustee and a “flagrantly non-compliant Frankenstein bid” that was allowed to win, despite a competing offer.
Jones “alleges, without evidence, collusion and bad faith in an attempt to mislead the Court and disqualify its only competition in the auction,” bankruptcy trustee Christopher R. Murray wrote in response. He called the motion “a disappointed bidder’s improper attempt to influence an otherwise fair and open auction process.”
The bankruptcy judge overseeing the transfer has scheduled a hearing on December 9 to hear arguments to disqualify The Onion’s bid or allow the company to move forward with its purchase.
The long-running satire publication intends to re-launch InfoWars as a satirized version of itself.
“The joint bid from Global Tetrahedron and the Connecticut families has been selected as the winning bid for InfoWars,” The Onion’s CEO Ben Collins told The Independent earlier this month. “The sale is currently underway as part of the standard processes.”
But Musk — a close ally of president-elect Donald Trump who is recommending steep cuts to the federal budget and mass firings of government workers — is “going to be very involved in this,” Jones said on a broadcast earlier this month.
“The cavalry is here,” he said. “Trump is pissed.”
