Most recently, Musk spread conspiracy theories about Muslim “grooming gangs” in the UK, and called for Tommy Robinson, a far-right activist, to be released from prison. Musk’s support for Robinson, who has a history of posting racist and Islamophobic content, initially saw Reform UK leader Nigel Farage push back against the X owner. But in a TV show he hosts on the right-wing GB News station this week, Farage appeared to bend the knee to Musk.

“I don’t think [Robinson’s] wrong in everything he says,” Farage told his viewers. “I do question why he’s in prison, and being kept in solitary confinement.” (Robinson is in prison after being found in contempt of court for repeating lies about a Syrian refugee.)

Last year, Musk spent months antagonizing Brazilian supreme court justice Alexandre de Moraes after the court issued orders for X to remove a handful of accounts and content that, it said, had violated the law by undermining faith in the integrity of the country’s elections. After Brazil’s right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro lost his re-election bid in 2022, his supporters stormed the country’s legislature on January 8, 2023, claiming that the election had been stolen (it hadn’t), in an echo of the January 6, 2021 insurrection at the US Capitol. Moraes was a staunch opponent of Bolsonaro. X spent months refusing to obey the order, even turning over sealed court orders to the US Congress’ Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, led by right-wing congressman Jim Jordan, which then released them publicly.

At the time, many in Brazil felt that Musk’s actions, as well as the release of the orders, were a move to undermine the country’s democracy and sovereignty. The Brazilian court eventually issued an order to block X in the country for noncompliance and issued a fine against Musk-owned...