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| - In November 2024, a number of viral posts claimed Elon Musk had banned horror author Stephen King from X. King had allegedly trolled Musk by calling him President-elect Donald Trump's "first lady."
One post on X stated, "So the First Lady Elon Musky banned Stephen King because he called him the First Lady. I guess Musky's big play about free speech on Twitter or X-rated bizarre land doesn't apply if hurts your wittle feewings." Another praised King for supposedly trolling Musk:
(X user @JerasIkehorn)
While King has been critical of both Musk and Trump in the past, he was still active on X and had not been removed from the platform as of this writing. King debunked the rumor on his own official X account. We thus rate this claim as false.
We found no "first lady" post about Musk on King's X account, but he has frequently criticized Musk and Trump on the platform. In one post from Nov. 3, 2024, King wrote (archived), "The Musk-man has posted 3,000 times on Twitter in the last month. Most are pro-Trump disinformation and outright lies. Remember, he has skin in the game. Consider his posts accordingly."
On Nov. 4, 2024, King wrote (archived) on X, "Last tweet from me (probably not from the Musk-Man) before Election Day: IF YOU LOVE DEMOCRACY, PLEASE VOTE FOR KAMALA HARRIS."
On Nov. 13, 2024, King debunked the claim about being thrown off X (archived) on his verified account: "I see there's a rumor going around that I called the Musk-man Trump's new first lady. I didn't, but only because I didn't think of it. There's also a rumor going around that Muskie kicked me off Twitter. Yet here I am."
The rumor spread after Trump selected Musk to head up a U.S. commission called the "Department of Government Efficiency." Trump wrote on TruthSocial the goal of this department was to "dismantle government bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures, and restructure federal agencies."
This is not the first time there has been a false rumor about Musk kicking King off X. In July 2024, a satirical Facebook post claimed King had been banned permanently from the platform for trolling Musk.
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