Elon Musk's million-dollar lottery during the election now being investigated
During last year's U.S. campaign, the aftermath of Elon Musk's "million-dollar lottery" targeting "swing state" voters is still ongoing. On August 20, a U.S. federal judge required Musk to respond to a class-action lawsuit against the lottery activity. Arizona resident Jacqueline McCafferty claimed that Musk misled "swing state" voters into providing personal identification information to participate in the activity, but voters actually had no real chance of winning.
According to Reuters, this lawsuit was filed on November 5, 2022, which was the U.S. election day. U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman in Austin, Texas, stated that McCafferty's proposed class-action lawsuit raised reasonable allegations, and Musk and his "America PAC" (American Political Action Committee) had improperly induced her to provide personal identification information through the lottery activity in the latter stages of the last election.
According to McCafferty's allegations, Musk and "America PAC" lured voters in seven key states to sign petitions, promising to randomly select a $1 million winner like buying a lottery ticket, but in reality, voters had no real chance of winning.
She said that voters who signed the petitions were also required to provide their names, addresses, emails, and phone numbers.
Musk and "America PAC" lawyers did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
In requesting to dismiss the lawsuit, Musk listed several "red flags" to prove that he did not conduct an illegal lottery. He emphasized that he had mentioned that the $1 million winner would be "selected to earn the prize," and that winners would have to serve as "America PAC" spokespeople, which negated the idea that the $1 million was a "prize" in a lottery.
However, Pitman believed that Musk's side used the wording of "rewarding" $1 million and mentioned that the money could be "won."
In his ruling, he wrote: "The plaintiff has reason to believe that the defendant objectively provided an opportunity to enter a random drawing, even if that was not the defendant's actual intent."
Musk also denied the claim that people who signed the petition suffered harm due to providing contact information. However, Pitman said that experts in the political data brokerage field could testify to the value of this personal information for "swing state" voters.
Original: www.toutiao.com/article/1841055311264776/
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