Elon Musk is finally taking the gloves off.
Sick of advertisers’ refusal to take out ads on X, Musk directed his social media platform CEO Linda Yaccarino to file antitrust lawsuit against some of the biggest players in the advertising business, including the Global Alliance for Responsible Media and the World Federation of Advertisers.
Musk and his team believe the advertising conglomerates are illegally in cahoots to boycott X.
Now, he says, it’s “war.”
We tried peace for 2 years, now it is war https://t.co/elgT62uDtF
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 6, 2024
FOX Business reports on the heart of the lawsuit. Here is the start of their story:
Elon Musk’s social media platform, X, has filed an antitrust lawsuit against The Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM), accusing the advertising group of illegally boycotting companies, including X, formerly known as Twitter.
X CEO Linda Yaccarino announced Tuesday the company has filed a lawsuit against GARM, World Federation of Advertisers (WFA), and GARM members CVS Health, Mars, Orsted and Unilever.
FOX Business has reached out to all defendants for comment.
Yaccarino said X filed the suit after reviewing the House Judiciary Committee’s recent investigation that found evidence “GARM and its members directly organized boycotts and used other indirect tactics to target disfavored platforms, content creators, and news organizations in an effort to demonetize and, in effect, limit certain choices for consumers.”
She said X determined GARM’s tactics have cost X billions of dollars.
In a Tuesday press release, the video-sharing platform and cloud services provider Rumble announced it was joining the lawsuit.
GARM claims to be “apolitical” and “voluntary” and says that it benefits its members by providing use of “resources and information about best practices to learn where their advertising investments go, and to avoid placement next to illegal or harmful content that could damage their brands’ reputation.”
However, GARM’s critics have a different view of the organization and suggest that it has colluded with dozens of major U.S. corporations to push boycotts and suppress speech in a manner that targets conservatives.
