Brazil’s Supreme Court has upheld a nationwide ban on X, the social media platform owned by Elon Musk, who has been openly feuding with a judge over the proliferation of right-wing political misinformation on the website.
A Supreme Court panel decision on Monday affirmed a Friday ruling from Alexandre de Moraes, a Brazilian Supreme Court justice, to suspend X over concerns about disinformation and the company’s refusal to appoint a local legal representative as required by law. Moraes also said that users who circumvent the ban with a virtual private network, or VPN, could be fined 50,000 reais — or roughly $9,000 — a day.
Moraes has aggressively cracked down on online disinformation in the past few years in what he has described as a bid to protect Brazilian democracy. His suspension of X was the culmination of months of escalating tensions between him and Musk, who has used the platform to amplify right-wing grievances over “free speech” in Brazil and accuse Moraes of trying to suppress right-wing voices on X.
Last month, after Moraes threatened arrests over X’s refusal to comply with orders to suspend some accounts, Musk shuttered the company’s office in Brazil.
The billionaire has called for Moraes’ imprisonment and lobbed personal attacks against the justice. Starlink, Musk’s satellite internet service provider, has also refused to comply with Moraes’ order to block access to X, setting up another conflict with the justice.
Musk has selectively portrayed himself as a free-speech crusader in line with the hard-right turn of his personal politics. He has increasingly used X as a platform for his political views, amplifying right-wing conspiracy theories and boosting far-right leaders across the globe, including GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, whom he endorsed in July. His feud with Moraes has also positioned him as a major player in trying to revive former President Jair Bolsonaro’s flagging political power.
