--- title: "Hypocrite Elon Musk Attacks Voting by Mail, But Records Show He’s Done It Himself" description: "Elon Musk has voted by mail at least twice in California, records show, which are the only two times he ever voted in the state." date: "2024-08-30" modified: "2024-08-30" authors: - name: "Frank Landymore" job_title: "Contributing Writer" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/flandymore" url: "https://futurism.com/the-byte/elon-musk-voting-by-mail" categories: - "Elon Musk" - "Future Society" - "The Industrialists" tags: - "elon musk" - "the digest" --- # Hypocrite Elon Musk Attacks Voting by Mail, But Records Show He’s Done It Himself ![Elon Musk has voted by mail at least twice in California, records show, which are the only two times he ever voted in the state.]() *\Image: Justin Sullivan via Getty\* ## Busted! This just in: Elon Musk is a hypocrite. The tech billionaire has frequently railed against voting by mail this year, calling it "insane," and framing it as a gateway to widespread fraud. But it turns out that Musk has voted by mail at least twice while he lived in California, [*NBC News* reports]() — just one of [many examples]() of [Musk's two-facedness](). According to documents obtained through a public records request to the California secretary of state's office, Musk voted by mail in November 2016 for the presidential election, and again in the November 2018 midterm election. Strikingly, those were the only two times Musk appears to have voted in the entire 18 years he was eligible to do so in the state, according to *NBC*, after he became a US citizen in 2002. He's since moved to Texas, where his [voting participation record]() doesn't appear that great, either. ## Election Misdirection Musk has been undergoing a rightward turn over the past few years, crystallized lately by his [endorsement of Donald Trump]() this July, who he has [supported via a super PAC](). He's harped on voting by mail [since at least January](), when he called it "insane," and before that had [long spread claims]() of [voting fraud in several elections](), including the race between President Joe Biden and Trump in 2020. This year, Musk seems to have narrowed his focus to mail-in ballots as a pathway to widespread election fraud, a [position echoed by Trump]() in the past (though it seems, [not anymore]()). In July, for example, Musk [shared another user's lengthy tweet]() that claimed that the 2024 election will be "the most rigged in history." "When combined with mail-in ballots, the system is \*designed\* to make it impossible to prove fraud," Musk added as commentary. "Mail-in and drop box ballots should not be allowed." He also doubled down on his views after *NBC* reached out to him. "Voting by mail has been recognized as an invitation to fraud throughout the world," Musk wrote in an email. ## Get on the Same Page That's tough talk from a guy who has used mail-in ballots himself — but the ironies don't end there. *NBC* also discovered that Musk's pro-Trump super PAC, called the America PAC, has actually been encouraging swing state voters to vote by mail, too. "SCAN HERE TO APPLY FOR YOUR ABSENTEE BALLOT," reads a mailer sent by the America PAC to Wisconsin voters, which includes a QR code that leads to the PAC's website. Perhaps the PAC's team have done the actual political calculus and realized that there's [no evidence mail-in voting leads to widespread election fraud]() in the US — it's just a good way to get people to vote. Which Musk, in all his years of being eligible, has only provably done a handful of times. **More on Elon Musk:** *[Elon Musk Seems to Have Completely Missed the Point of "Star Trek"]()* ## Author At Futurism, my work has often centered on bringing a sense of clarity and insight to complex topics ranging from the regulation of emerging technologies to the esoteric ideologies of Silicon Valley executives, while striving not to lose the poetic sense of awe inspired by often-obscure fields like astrophysics and quantum computing. I broke the story of CNET using AI to produce articles that turned out to be riddled with factual errors and plagiarism — a dam-breaking inflection point, as I've reported, that's inspired copycats and endless discourse while beguiling stakeholders ranging from tech giants to purveyors of spam around the web. My work at Futurism has been cited by publications including CBS News, the Los Angeles Times, Vice, Gizmodo, Engadget, the Verge, and Vanity Fair. I grew up in locales ranging from India to China, and now live in the exotic suburbs of Virginia. In my free time, I'm an avid reader of weird sci-fi literature, an aficionado of East Asian cinema, and, regrettably, a relapsed gamer. Allegedly, I’m working on a debut novel, currently untitled. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()