Elon Musk Triggered Into Twitter-Rage As Internet Mercilessly Reminds Him Of Ghislaine Maxwell Photo

Elon Musk has spent a good portion of the long weekend so far defending himself on Twitter over a stir that was created when journalist Ken Klippenstein of The Nation decided to remind the internet of Musk’s previous ties to Jeffrey Epstein, including a photograph of Musk with Ghislaine Maxwell.

This led Musk into a Twitter rage, lashing out at Klippenstein with memes, while Klippenstein reminded Musk of his history with Epstein…

Hey Elon, what’s up with this https://t.co/Oa0fST2rV3 pic.twitter.com/Ge1DO47MHN

— Ken Klippenstein (@kenklippenstein) July 4, 2020

…which eventually led to Musk, whining like a scorned child to his actual Twitter-sitter, Jack Dorsey, for help. As one social media user put it:

Its all free speech this, free speech that, until people start criticizing me pic.twitter.com/qNKmHurO6T

— Don Moynihan (@donmoyn) July 4, 2020

And Klippenstein himself replied to the Tweet with an emoji of a baby:

? https://t.co/k0chgOebxz

— Ken Klippenstein (@kenklippenstein) July 4, 2020

That whining to Twitter’s censor-machine was, naturally, only after Musk himself referred to Klippenstein as a "douche-about-town" in an earlier Tweet.

Regardless, the internet has dutifully sided with Klippenstein and has spent the majority of its long weekend posting and re-posting this image and variants of the image.

Many posts about Musk and Musk’s posts themselves have been ratioed with reminders of Musk’s ties to Maxwell, regardless of how firm or how loose they may have been at the time. Other journalists have come to Klippenstein’s defense, as well:

Hi Elon, I’m a picture editor with the Sunday Sport in London. Huge fan of your tweets! I was wondering if you could help me identify the woman on the left, for the society column I write. Thanks! pic.twitter.com/pfBdeQv4Xb

— hk (@HKesvani) July 4, 2020

It has seemed to trigger Musk, who even apparently "gave permission" to his ex-wife Talulah Riley to come to his defense. She parroted a similar line as Musk’s defense all weekend, which was essentially that he was "photobombed" by Maxwell. 

I don’t usually comment on such things, but given the truly horrific nature of what is being implied up and down my timeline today, I wanted to respond publicly with @elonmusk’s permission. However, I speak only for myself. https://t.co/WA3sqKR4tV pic.twitter.com/aK8A4HvNAH

— Talulah Riley (@TalulahRiley) July 4, 2020

The note from Riley led to some other obvious sounding conclusions…

Elon claimed he doesn’t know Ghislaine, but he and his ex wife have been to Epstein’s HOUSE ??‍♀️.

Hard to believe him. https://t.co/r3kQQc56oz

— $Reina Nakamoto ? (@mindstatex) July 4, 2020

And the ties to Epstein aren’t exactly a huge surprise for us to hear about, either.

Recall, back in 2018, we wrote that Jeffrey Epstein had told a New York Times columnist that he was helping Elon Musk find a new chairman for Tesla. The columnist wrote at the time that he contacted Epstein to begin with in August 2018 because he had “heard a rumor that he was advising Tesla’s embattled chief executive, Elon Musk, who was in trouble after announcing on Twitter that he had lined up the funding to take Tesla private.”

"I’d heard that Mr. Epstein was compiling a list of candidates at Mr. Musk’s behest — and that Mr. Epstein had an email from Mr. Musk authorizing the search for a new chairman."

When the columnist met Epstein in 2018, he pushed him on the purported e-mail, only to be told it was from "someone close" to Musk, and not Musk himself:

When I pressed him on the purported email from Mr. Musk, he said the email wasn’t from Mr. Musk himself, but from someone very close to him. He wouldn’t say who that person was. I asked him if that person would talk to me, and he said he’d ask. He later said the person declined; I doubt he asked.