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Elon Musk says he’s running multiple ‘system scale tests’ ahead of his livestream with Donald Trump.
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Musk’s X platform crashed repeatedly while hosting Ron DeSantis’ campaign launch last year.
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DeSantis’ event was widely ridiculed, with the Trump campaign calling it a “complete failure.”
It appears Elon Musk is doing everything he can to ensure his upcoming interview with former President Donald Trump on Monday doesn’t go awry.
“I will be performing some system scale tests tonight and tomorrow in preparation for the conversation with Donald Trump,” Musk wrote in an X message Sunday night.
The erratic billionaire then tested the X platform by live-streaming himself gaming twice.
Musk’s first stream, which lasted about 19 minutes, was viewed 2.1 million times. His second stream, which lasted about 46 minutes, was viewed 1.3 million times at the time of writing.
Ensuring X’s stability is likely a top priority for Musk, given the platform’s inconsistent performance last year.
In May 2023, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis launched his presidential campaign on X instead of cable television. DeSantis’ launch didn’t go exactly as planned, however. The much-hyped livestream got off to a rocky start and ran into multiple technical issues.
The glitchy livestream was ridiculed by many, including the Trump campaign.
“Glitchy. Technical difficulties. Awkward silences. A complete failure to launch. And that’s just the candidate!” a Trump spokesperson told Business Insider at the time.
Still, it appears the DeSantis debacle didn’t stop Trump from doing a livestreamed X interview.
But while Trump is happy to appear on X for an interview, he sticks to his own social media platform, Truth Social.
The once prolific Twitter user left for Truth Social after being banned from the platform following the January 6 riots.
Although Musk reinstated Trump’s X account in November 2022, Trump has only posted on it once: in August 2023, when he shared a photo of his arrest citation and a link to his campaign website.
For what it’s worth, Musk’s outspoken support for Trump may have been crucial in slowly returning him to the platform. The GOP candidate has been effusive in his praise of Musk and his businesses since Musk endorsed him.
On August 3, Trump told attendees at a rally in Georgia that he had changed his mind about electric vehicles after receiving support from Tesla’s CEO.
“I’m for electric cars. I have to be, because you know, Elon has been very supportive of me. So I have no choice,” Trump told the crowd, adding that people should still have access to gas-powered vehicles.
Representatives for Musk and the Trump campaign did not immediately respond to requests for comment from BI outside regular business hours.
Read the original article on Business Insider
