Austin, Texas – Billionaire Elon Musk has called for the release of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin, who is pushing for his conviction on the murder of George Floyd to be overturned.
In a post on his X platform on Wednesday, Musk claimed that Chauvin was “unjustly convicted of murder” and, therefore, “should be freed.”
“The facts show that he was not the cause of death, nor did he at any time intend for a death to occur. Whatever else he may be, he is not a murderer,” Musk wrote, adding, “That is the truth.”
On May 25, 2020, Minneapolis officers responded to a call from a convenience store that claimed a man had tried to use a counterfeit $20 bill.
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Upon arrival, officers confronted Floyd, and Chauvin proceeded to kneel on his neck for nine and a half minutes as a crowd of bystanders watched.
Floyd, who repeatedly said “I can’t breathe” during the altercation, was pronounced dead at the scene.
Autopsy reports deemed the cause of death a homicide caused by complications from cardiopulmonary arrest, but, in spite of the facts, Musk and other far-right figures have insisted drugs were behind Floyd’s death and that Chauvin’s 2021 conviction came out of a fear of backlash.
Musk continued sharing posts about Chauvin into Thursday, arguing in one that the former officer “called for an ambulance immediately” and sharing another that featured a comic suggesting Black people threatened to “burn the city down” if Chauvin wasn’t convicted.
Musk’s outcry of support comes after Chauvin and his legal team filed a petition to vacate his murder conviction, alleging his trial was derailed by procedural failures.
In recent years, Musk has become a leading far-right figure, spending tons of his own money to boost President Donald Trump and Republican politicians and using his X platform to spread misinformation, white supremacist rhetoric, and conspiracy theories.
It’s worth noting that a month after the Minneapolis incident, Musk called for justice for Floyd and argued the other officers should also face punishment for standing by and doing nothing.
