Elon’s Musk Taken to Task By His Own AI Tool for ‘Election Bribery’ As He Dangled to $2M In Handouts to Voters Before Crucial Wisconsin Supreme Court Race
Elon Musk’s America First PAC announced Friday it had awarded $1 million to Scott Ainsworth, a mechanical engineer from Green Bay, for signing its petition protesting against “activist” judges less than a week before Wisconsin voters will go to the polls to vote for a new Supreme Court justice, one who could dramatically tilt the state’s ideological direction.
Grok, the featured AI program on his social media platform, X, took its billionaire creator to task in a post Friday morning, writing the financial incentive, though “aimed at boosting participation … could be seen as election bribery.”
“Elon Musk’s $1M checks for voting in WI’s Supreme Court election likely violate Wisconsin law (Statute 12.11), which bans offering value to induce or reward voting,” Grok wrote. “The WI Elections Commission confirms incentives over $1 are illegal.”
Later Friday, Musk clarified his reasons for visiting Wisconsin after deleting a social media post saying he planned to “personally hand over” $2 million to a pair of voters who had already voted in the race between two county judges: Democrat Susan Crawford and Republican Brad Schimel.
Musk posted that the money would go to people who would be “spokesmen” for an online petition against “activist” judges. After first saying the event would only be open to people who had voted in the Supreme Court race, he said attendance would be limited to those who have signed the petition.
Ainsworth, a Donald Trump loyalist, encouraged people in a video on X to sign the petition and “get out and vote early for Brad Schimel.” The petition, designed to collect data on Wisconsin voters and energize them, aligns with Trump’s claim that “activist” judges are illegally working to subvert his agenda.
The payment, which Musk announced Wednesday, is similar to a lottery that Musk’s political action committee operated last year in Wisconsin and other battleground states before the November election.
A judge in Pennsylvania said prosecutors failed to establish that the effort was an illegal lottery and allowed it to continue through Election Day.
“It’s corrupt, it’s extreme, and it’s disgraceful to our state and judiciary,” Crawford spokesperson Derrick Honeyman said in a statement.
Jay Heck, executive director of Common Cause in Wisconsin, said Musk was using the payments to influence the election.
“Whether or not Wisconsinites will believe this is legitimate or not probably won’t be settled until after the election,” Heck said. “But this not what a Wisconsin Supreme Court election ought to be decided on. Races for the high court are supposed to be on judicial temperament and impartiality, not huge amounts of money for partisan purposes.”
The race between Crawford and Schimel has captured national attention, as many see it an early test of how voters view Trump’s agenda. A Schimel win would flip the court to a one-vote conservative majority.
Musk’s shifting explanations for the Wisconsin visit came as Wisconsin’s Democratic attorney general announced he would seek a court order to prevent Musk from handing out the million-dollar checks.
In his deleted post, Musk wrote that he planned to give $1 million each to two voters at the event on Sunday, just two days before the Wisconsin Supreme Court election.
“I will also personally hand over two checks for a million dollars each in appreciation for you taking the time to vote,” Musk’s now-deleted post said. “This is super important.”
Musk had promised $100 to any registered Wisconsin voter who signed the petition or forwarded it to someone who did.
That led to questions about the petition’s legality, with some arguing it violated Wisconsin law, which makes it a felony to offer, give, lend, or promise to lend or give anything of value to induce a voter to cast a ballot or not vote.
By changing the terms, Musk may have mitigated the circumstances but failed to resolve the legality question, said Bryan Godar, staff attorney with the State Democracy Research Initiative at the University of Wisconsin Law School.
“The question is whether the offers are ‘in order to induce’ people to vote or go to the polls, and there can be arguments made on either side of that question,” Godar said in an email.
Musk has spent roughly $20 million in Wisconsin on behalf of Schimel, who was endorsed last week by President Trump.
“All Voters who believe in Common Sense should GET OUT TO VOTE EARLY for Brad Schimel,” Trump wrote in a Truth Social post.