Elon Musk one of the world’s richest people and boasting a twitter following of more than 3x the UK population has waged in on the UK’s grooming scandal
The grooming scandal relates to a number of cases where at least 1,400 children were subjected to appalling sexual exploitation in Rotherham between 1997 and 2013. Similar scandals occurred in other towns like Oldham, Telford and Oxford leading to a national inquiry into child sexual abuse.
Musk has elevated the issue through X, with multiple posts a day raising awareness and criticising the UK government. This has been problematic as he called Jess Phillips (Safeguarding minister) a ‘genocidal rape apologist’ and his accusations have been tarnished with misinformation and disinformation. A man has now been arrested for threats towards Jess Phillips although there is no proof that this is connected, it may be that Musk’s comments motivated the individual
Musk went further to call for the release of Tommy Robinson, who is currently serving a prison sentence for contempt of court as he refused to stop libellous claims against a Syrian refugee. Many argue that Robinson has been problematic when it comes to the response to grooming scandals as his comments and interference with cases has slowed down procedures and made court cases more complex. Musk’s support of Tommy Robinson has led to troubled relations with political ally Nigel Farage as Farage stated that he would not support him, which resulted with Elon Musk calling for him to leave Reform as leader.
Relations with other parties have also been impacted with Starmer calling out Elon Musk for his dangerous rhetoric, and Ed Davey, leader of the Liberal Democrats calling for the U.S ambassador to be summoned as Musk is an incoming US government official.
As this story continues to develop its important to understand the facts surrounding the story. Check out this article below:
What is Keir Starmer’s record on prosecuting grooming gangs? - BBC News