Elon Musk’s $1 million giveaway for voters who sign his free-speech and gun-rights petition falls into a gray area of election law, and legal experts are divided about whether the billionaire supporter of Donald Trump could be running afoul of prohibitions on paying people to register to vote. The Tesla CEO is promising to give $1 million each day to a randomly selected person who signs his online petition pledging to support the First and Second amendments of the U.S. Constitution, which protect the rights to free speech and gun ownership.
"There is certainly an argument that this falls within the scope of a federal prohibition on paying a person to vote or register to vote,” said Daniel Weiner of the left-leaning Brennan Center for Justice. "This is part of a pattern of him skating up to the edge of election laws that we’ve seen in the past several weeks.”
Musk's representatives did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Monday.
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