Brazil judge seizes $3 million from Musk to pay X fines

Tesla and SpaceX chief executive officer Elon Musk listens to a question as he speaks at the SATELLITE Conference and Exhibition in Washington, March 9, 2020. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File)

Brasília — Brazil’s Supreme Court said Friday that a judge has ordered the transfer of some $3 million from Elon Musk’s companies to pay fines incurred by his social network X, which has been suspended in the country.

Judge Alexandre de Moraes last month ordered X shut down in Brazil after Musk refused to remove dozens of right-wing accounts and then failed to name a new legal representative in the country as ordered.

A brief statement from the court said Moraes had “determined the transfer to state coffers of 18.35 million reais ($3.28 million) blocked in accounts” of X and the satellite internet firm Starlink, both owned by Musk.

Moraes has repeatedly clashed with the South African-born billionaire after making it his mission to crack down on disinformation.

He also froze the assets of X and Starlink, which has been operating in Brazil since 2022 — especially in remote communities in the Amazon —  to ensure payment of fines imposed on X for its failure to follow court orders.

The social media platform formerly known as Twitter has more than 22 million users in Brazil.

Moraes also ordered that those using “technological subterfuges” such as virtual private networks (VPNs) to access the blocked site could be fined up to $9,000.

His measures have fueled debate on freedom of expression and the limits of social networks both inside and outside of the country.

Leftist President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva hailed the ban, while his far-right predecessor Jair Bolsonaro called Moraes a “dictator.”