Elon Musk's social media platform, X, is suing a group of advertisers, accusing them of violating antitrust laws by coordinating an advertising boycott against the company.
Linda Yaccarino, CEO of X, announced the lawsuit in a video and open letter posted on the platform on Tuesday.
The suit claims that after Musk’s takeover of X in 2022, GARM allegedly persuaded top brands to withhold their advertising dollars as part of a collective boycott aimed at harming the company’s revenue streams.
According to The New York Times, X alleges that this coordinated effort sought to deprive the platform's diverse user base—from sports fans to political leaders—of what it calls the “Global Town Square.”
Yaccarino emphasized the broader implications of the boycott in her statement: “To put it simply, people are hurt when the marketplace of ideas is undermined and some viewpoints are not funded over others as part of an illegal boycott.”
Musk is known for his confrontational style, and he has not shied away from publicly addressing the lawsuit.
In a series of posts on X, he urged other companies facing similar boycotts to take legal action, even hinting at potential criminal liability under the RICO Act.
“We tried peace for 2 years, now it is war,” Musk declared.
Musk's ownership of X has been marked by controversy, particularly regarding his approach to content moderation and free speech.
After making major changes to the platform, including cutting its moderation team, X saw a mass exodus of advertisers concerned about rising antisemitic and hateful rhetoric on the site.
This loss of advertisers dealt a severe blow to the platform's revenue, with documents obtained by Bloomberg indicating that X lost around 40% of its revenue shortly after Musk's takeover.
In response to the advertiser pullout, Musk has adopted an aggressive stance, infamously telling departing advertisers to "go f..." themselves last November.
While efforts have been made to lure advertisers back, success has been limited.
Business Insider's Peter Kafka noted last month that it remains unclear whether these efforts will succeed.
