It’s official. Elon Musk now owns Twitter after closing the deal by a court-imposed Friday deadline, according to multiple outlets, ending a six-month journey over his controversial $44 billion acquisition.
CNBC first reported Thursday evening that Musk had taken control of Twitter and the company’s CEO Parag Agrawal and chief financial officer Ned Segal had left and would not be returning. Multiple outlets reported that Agrawal and Segal, along with other Twitter executives, were fired.
Musk hasn’t disclosed his plans for Twitter in much detail, but he indicated he wants to pull back some content moderation measures in a way critics warn could lead to more hate speech and disinformation on the platform.
It’s not clear if any changes to Twitter will be immediate enough to impact the approaching November midterm elections, but updates to Twitter’s policies could come ahead of the 2024 election.
One of the most high-profile changes Musk has indicated he would take is allowing former President Trump back on the platform.
Despite Musk’s calls for a “free speech” platform, indicating a laxer approach to moderating content, he told investors in a public message Thursday that Twitter “obviously cannot become a free-for-all hellscape, where anything can be said with no consequences.”