Downing Street has condemned Elon Musk for his claim that “civil war is inevitable” in Britain, saying there is “no justification for comments like that”.
The spokesperson added: “We’re talking about a minority of thugs that do not speak for Britain.”
Misinformation on Mr Musk’s social media platform Twitter/X has been blamed for helping to fuel racist far-right riots and attacks.
Following lies about the identity of the suspect in the Southport knife attack, disorder continued across the weekend as racist mobs clashed with police in Hull, Halifax, Liverpool, London, Southport and Rotherham, and started fires at hotels housing asylum seekers in Manvers and Tamworth.
Follow our live blog for the latest updates
With posts featuring misinformation on Twitter/X garnering millions of interactions, Mr Musk – who bought the platform in 2022 for £34.5bn – responded to a post on Sunday sharing footage of the violence, which claimed disorder is the “effects of mass migration and open borders”.
“Civil war is inevitable,” the Tesla and SpaceX founder replied. It marks the sixth time since October that Mr Musk has claimed civil war is brewing in Europe.
On Monday, Downing Street reiterated that social media companies “can and should be doing more” to counter misleading or dangerous material hosted on their platforms, adding that they have a responsibility to ensure the safety of their users.
Mr Musk drew criticism from across the political spectrum for his remarks, with Tim Montgomerie, editor of the Conservative Home website, saying: “Extraordinarily irresponsible from Elon Musk. We need leaders to de-escalate, not raise fears.”
Michael Stephens, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute, said: “Proof if ever it was needed that making electric cars and space rockets does not equal political understanding. Civil war is absolutely not inevitable. The UK is a small space filled with a lot of people. We all have to make it work.”
The Thick of It writer Armando Iannucci said: “Tomorrow morning you’ll see the people who live here tidy these streets up. Small gangs of thugs do not a mass movement make. You’ve been taken in by your own platform, which amplifies noise at the expense of facts.”
But such inflammatory claims have been echoed by other public figures, with actor-turned-right-wing activist Laurence Fox seeking to cast prime minister Sir Keir Starmer as a “traitor” on the side of “immigrant barbarians”, adding in a Twitter/X post “liked” nearly 60,000 times: “Fine. Then it’s war.”
As calls emerged for greater regulation of social media, Professor Marc Owen Jones, a disinformation researcher at Doha’s Hamad Bin Khalifa University, said: “X has been weaponised to spread rumours and hate speech, particularly targeting minorities, people of a Muslim background, to inflame tensions.”
“Unfortunately, social media companies make it all too easy for potential bad actors to set up anonymous accounts and spread rumours,” Prof Jones told BBC News.
“The idea with a disinformation campaign, if you have someone acting in bad faith, they will spread falsehoods and then other people in good faith, regular Joe, might pick it up because they believe that person to be credible, and then spread it. And that’s what we’re seeing in Southport,” he said.
Since buying Twitter in 2022 and rebranding it as X, Mr Musk has allowed many previously banned figures back onto the platform, including Tommy Robinson, with whom Mr Musk interacted on Twitter/X as the former EDL leader was accused of inflaming tensions in the UK from a hotel in Cyprus.
Hours earlier, Sir Keir had issued a message to social media firms during a press conference in Downing Street, saying: “Violent disorder, clearly whipped up online, that is also a crime, it’s happening on your premises, and the law must be upheld everywhere.”
Painting himself as a champion of free speech, as many users report increased hateful and extreme content on Twitter/X, Mr Musk has also endorsed Republican candidate Donald Trump in the upcoming US elections and has spoken about wanting to destroy the “woke mind virus”.
The Independent has contacted Mr Musk for comment.