ELON MUSK and Nigel Farage are dominating the Tory leadership election race as candidates struggle with statements by the X boss and Reform owner-leader over the far-right riots.
Former work and pensions secretary Mel Stride described Mr Musk’s remarks, which have included predicting a civil war, as “absurd and deeply, deeply unhelpful” today.
He also slammed the X mogul for sharing fake stories alleging rioters were to be dispatched to camps on the Falklands Islands.
But Mr Stride drew the line at quitting X, saying he would continue to use the platform although there had to be a “measured look at the way in which sites like X are feeding conspiracy theories, misinformation and violence on our streets.”
Another leadership hopeful, ex-security minister Tom Tugendhat, took aim at Mr Farage, who exercises a fatal attraction for many within the Tory Party.
Accusing the Clacton MP of “amplifying false information” and failing to unambiguously condemn the violence, Mr Tugendhat said “this is not leadership. It is deeply irresponsible and dangerous.”
Mr Tugendhat and Mr Stride are competing, alongside former home secretary James Cleverley, for the more centrist votes among the Tory membership, probably too small a community to carry any to victory.
Robert Jenrick, who has called for shouting “Allahu Akbar” — God is great — to be criminalised, culture warrior Kemi Badenoch and another ex-home secretary, Priti Patel, are tussling for the backing of the more numerous hard-right element in the ageing Tory electorate.
The darling of the hardest right, Suella Braverman, has decided not to contest the election, although it seems she could not secure the required 10 nominations from MPs. Rumours are rife that she may defect to Reform.
Mr Musk won backing from ex-premier Liz Truss, who said: “I am appalled by the attacks on free speech in Britain and Europe. Good for Elon Musk and X for standing up to these bullies.”
This earned Britain’s shortest-serving premier thanks from the X billionaire, but she was not spared further embarrassment.
She walked out of her own book launch in Suffolk after campaigners displayed a banner with the words “I crashed the economy” alongside a picture of a lettuce, a reference to the tabloid stunt which saw the videoed vegetable outlast Ms Truss’s stay in Downing Street.
The notoriously thin-skinned and humourless Ms Truss, who lost her Commons seat in the election, did not appreciate the joke and harrumphed off the stage.
