Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s interview with Elon Musk has been marred by technical problems, with the tech billionaire blaming a cyber attack.
The lengthy chat, which Mr Musk said was aimed at “open-minded independent voters”, started running late for more than 40 minutes as many users struggled to gain access.
Mr Musk, who previously owned X on Twitter, said the distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack “completed all our data lines”.
At the end of the two-hour conversation, he doubled down on his support for Trump and called on moderate voters to support the Republican campaign.
“Here’s an exciting, inspiring future that people can look forward to and be hopeful and excited about what’s next,” Mr Musk said.
The conversation began less auspiciously.
More than 20 minutes before the conversation began, many users struggled to access the livestream, with Mr Musk blaming “a massive DDOS attack on X” for the problems in a post.
Distributed denial of service attacks – or DDoS attacks – are attempts to make a website difficult to use or inaccessible.
As the conversation between the two began, Mr Musk said the cyber attack was an indication that the US was resistant to listening to Trump.
It’s unclear what caused the technical problems with the X audio chat or who might have been behind any attacks.
“A DDoS attack sends out a huge number of signals to disrupt an online target,” Anthony Lim, director of the Center for Strategic Cyberspace and International Studies in Singapore, told the BBC.
“It’s unlikely to affect just one service or feature on a website.”
Mr Lim said the high number of people trying to listen may have caused the service to be temporarily down.
However, Andrew Hay of IT firm Damovo said the cyberattack may have caused problems: “I believe the DDoS attack targeted the broadcast part of the X service without significantly affecting the core functionality of everyone else on the website.”
“It is relatively easy to conduct a large-scale DDoS attack, requiring a large number of compromised systems or an identified technical flaw in the target to drain its resources,” he added.
Mr Musk said in a subsequent post that the system had been tested with “8 million simultaneous listeners” before his live chat.
During the conversation, X Spaces showed about a million people listening
Reminds me of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis entering the White House race in May 2023. Held on X and saw a livestream crash.
The conversation at X comes as former president and Republican presidential candidate Trump tries to reset his re-election campaign.
Polls suggest Ms. Harris’s Democratic nomination has tightened a close race for the White House.
The Harris campaign is riding a fast wave after President Joe Biden dropped out of the race last month, after Harris carried the Democratic standard.
Next week, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, Ms. Harris and her husband, could win more at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago.
The Trump campaign is under fire for not interviewing Ms. Harris since accepting the nomination last month and fielding few questions from reporters.
During an interview on Monday, Trump said at X that “it’s nice to have a forum like this” where he can speak at length.
Mr Musk, who hosted the event, has become an increasingly influential voice in politics.
He has more than 190 million followers on X, where he regularly engages in political controversies.
He has also recently been involved with a new political group supporting Trump’s campaign.
But after his conversation with Trump, Mr Musk posted on X that he was “happy to host Kamal at an X space”, in an apparent invitation to Vice President Kamala Harris to attend such an event.
The relationship between Mr Musk and Mr Trump has changed over the years and they have traded online barbs in the past.
But Monday’s conversation between the two was cordial.
Skeptical of electric vehicles, Trump has previously promised to roll back federal subsidies, praising Tesla, the carmaker owned by Mr Musk.
He recently said he had “no choice” but to support EVs because of Mr Musk’s endorsement and on Monday called the Telsa product “excellent”.
Mr Musk said he was ready to help the Trump administration on a proposed “government efficiency commission”.
EU industry chief Thierry Breton told Mr Musk in a letter ahead of the high-level dialogue on the social media site, which is accessible by European users, that he must comply with EU digital content law.
The EU suspects X of breaching its rules in areas including tackling illegal content and misinformation.
In response, X chief executive Linda Yaccarino called it “an unprecedented attempt to extend the law applied in Europe to political activity in the United States.”
“It also supports European citizens, suggesting they are incapable of listening to a conversation and making their own decisions.”
Monday marks Trump’s return to X/Twitter after being removed from the platform after the January 6, 2021 Capitol riots.
Aside from a flurry of campaign ads on Trump’s account on Monday, Mr Musk has posted just one other post – his mug shot and a link to his campaign site – a year ago after Mr Musk reactivated his X account in 2022.
It’s unclear whether Trump, who posts frequently on his Truth social site, will post more frequently on X.
Monday’s interview touched on a range of issues, from an assassination attempt on Trump at a Pennsylvania rally last month to the US’s desire to acquire an “Iron Dome” missile defense system similar to the one in Israel and a key plank of his campaign. – Immigration.
If Trump wins the election in November, he has also considered closing the federal Department of Education and shifting that responsibility to the states as one of his first actions.
The Republican nominee spoke of Mr Biden’s decision to drop out of the race after a disastrous debate performance and pressure from vulnerable Democratic lawmakers, characterizing it as “a coup”.
Mr Biden said in a weekend interview with CBS that he had left because he feared the intra-party battle over his candidacy would be a “real distraction” ahead of the election.
In a statement after the event, the Harris campaign described Mr Musk and Trump as two “self-absorbed rich people who will sell out the middle class and can’t livestream in 2024”.
João da Silva contributed to this report
