Musk has spent days beefing with politicians over the far-right unrest sweeping the UK.

Elon Musk could be summoned for a grilling by British MPs over X’s role in race riots that have rocked the U.K. over the last week, as well as his own incendiary comments about the violence.

Labour MPs Chi Onwurah and Dawn Butler, who are competing to chair parliament’s science, innovation and technology committee, both told POLITICO they’d press the billionaire X owner and other technology executives to answer questions about the role of social media platforms amid mounting unrest in the U.K.

Musk has spent days beefing with British politicians over the riots, and is locked in a war of words with Prime Minister Keir Starmer over the U.K’s handling of them. Musk on Sunday wrote “civil war is inevitable” in the U.K. and claimed that the response by U.K. police has been “one-sided."

…

Musk’s platform X (formerly Twitter) saw misinformation about the identity of the attacker — wrongly identified as an asylum seeker who had just arrived in the U.K. — spread widely in the immediate aftermath of the attack.

The X boss has also come under fire for re-instating the account of high-profile far-right activist Tommy Robinson, who co-founded the English Defense League.

  • Flax@feddit.ukEnglish
    122·
    4 months ago

    I’m pretty sure the UK has quite a strong extradition power over the USA. Like all it takes is a British judge to summon someone in the USA for them to be extradited, few questions asked. The USA does have the same power mutually over the UK.

    • Spiralvortexisalie@lemmy.worldEnglish
      9·
      4 months ago

      There is always an extradition hearing if nothing else to ensure it comports with the governing treaty. The US and UK treaty has the usual provisions that it has to be a cognizable crime in America (with Article 2 essentially limiting that to felonies) and can not be political prosecution. Pretty much only militaries can summon someone as you say, and literally only by acting extrajudicially (think black helicopters in the middle of the night making the arrest).

      • Nasan@sopuli.xyz
        3·
        4 months ago

        I would settle for a couple of cozzers pulling up in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang to make the arrest

      • EnderMB@lemmy.world
        3·
        4 months ago

        This case alone has absolutely tarnished the reputation that the US has in the UK in the eyes of many people. It’s something people aren’t going to forget for a very long time, and could prove a blocker for cases where the US wishes to extradite in the future.

        • IcyToes@sh.itjust.works
          1·
          4 months ago

          They claimed it because she was married to a CIA employee.

          Kind of free reign to break the law and kill people if you’re a relative of a CIA employee. She could have been trialed without any risk to national security, so it’s absolutely a BS excuse.

          • Flax@feddit.ukEnglish
            2·
            4 months ago

            That is kind of mad. I think even staff at an embassy generally don’t get immunity, just the diplomats themselves, of which there’d be a small handful even for a large country

    • o9o@lemmy.worldEnglish
      2·
      4 months ago

      Not really. The extradition agreement is extremely one-sided, in favor of the US.

    • Echo Dot@feddit.uk
      1·
      4 months ago

      You serious? You actually think the US would deport musk against his will. No the only way Musk is coming over to the UK to face questioning is if he chooses to come over of his own accord. Which he probably will do because he’ll think it’s an opportunity to grandstand.

  • katy ✨@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    1·
    3 months ago

    just stop being cowards and ban twitter access in the uk. period.

    but it will never happen because mps are addicted to twitter and refuse to delete their accounts and move to other platforms.