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00:00Well, we are just under two weeks now from polling day, but 23 million
00:09Americans have already cast their ballots through in-person or postal
00:14voting. With the two candidates remaining neck and neck, several
00:17states, including the battlegrounds of North Carolina and Georgia, set
00:21records on their respective first days of early voting. Donald Trump has
00:26made two stops in Georgia this Wednesday, while Kamala Harris is in
00:30Mustwin, Pennsylvania, to take voters' questions live during a televised
00:35town hall with CNN. Experts are divided on the legality of the giveaway.
00:43Billionaire Elon Musk is promising to give a million dollars away each day
00:47to a randomly selected person who signs an online petition pledging to
00:52support the First and Second Amendments of the Constitution, which
00:55protect the rights to free speech and gun ownership. The petition is only
00:59open to voters in the seven swing states that are likely to decide the
01:04election, as Emily Boyle explains. Come on up here, Elon. Two weeks out
01:10from the US presidential vote, Elon Musk is testing the limits of election
01:14laws in the country. The billionaire, who has been a key supporter of
01:18Donald Trump, launched a $1 million giveaway. Every day from now until
01:23the election, we're giving out a $1 million prize, and all you have to do
01:29is sign a petition in support of the Constitution. His scheme encourages
01:33voters in seven swing states to sign a petition in favor of free speech and the
01:39right to bear arms. Those who refer another voter are offered a sum of $47
01:44each, or $100 in Pennsylvania, widely believed to be the deciding state in the
01:49November election. Legal experts have suggested the cash incentive may be
01:53illegal, as it offers financial rewards for an act that requires people to be
01:57registered voters. But there might be a loophole to the scheme. As nobody is
02:02being directly paid to register, they are only being paid to sign the petition
02:06under condition that they are already registered. It's probably true to say
02:10that Musk is in an area that might be considered a gray area, that might be
02:14pushing the envelope a bit. I think that argument has a couple of weaknesses to
02:18it. One, once again, there are a number of reasons why he might want registered
02:21voters on the petition and not unregistered voters. Secondly, the vast
02:25majority of Pennsylvanians are already registered to vote, upwards of 80%. So
02:31and there's nothing that prohibits any of those people from taking advantage of
02:33this. Faced with the blurred lines of the law, it is unclear whether Musk will
02:38ever come under legal scrutiny. But I don't think any of that converts this
02:43into an illegal payment for for registering. In the end, though, this
02:48isn't something we've seen before. And if you find some aggressive, ambitious
02:52prosecutor thinks he can make a name for himself, I guess we would find out
02:56but but I feel pretty confident that it would be very tough case to win and
03:01make stick. Despite calls from observers and political figures for a legal
03:05inquiry, no such investigation has been announced by the federal government. With
03:10the margins thinning with each passing day, every vote is a battlefield for
03:15the two presidential candidates.
03:18More on that petition. Let's cross live now to our Washington correspondent
03:22Fraser Jackson, who's on the campaign trail in Pennsylvania. Fraser, talk to
03:27us a little bit more about this Elon Musk scheme. He's assisting the Trump
03:32campaign. What does he gain from all of this?
03:36Well, Donald Trump has promised Elon Musk a job in his government. Were he
03:41to win the presidency, he said he would be the head of a government
03:44efficiency commission. And that is something that Elon Musk believes
03:48could be useful to streamline the red tape around the government and would
03:53boost business. Of course, remember, through his company, SpaceX and Tesla,
03:57Elon Musk receives millions of dollars worth of subsidies from the US
04:03government as well. So he definitely has an invested interest in that
04:06sense. But he's also helping the campaign in many different ways, using
04:10his other company, X, or Twitter, as it used to be known. He is posting
04:15regularly about Donald Trump, effectively giving him a lot of free
04:18time, free advertising on his platform. He's also using that platform to
04:23post misinformation and AI-generated images to his 200 million followers
04:28on the platform. And a lot of people have been worried about the rise of
04:31misinformation being spread on Twitter since Elon Musk took over. He's also
04:36on the campaign trail in earnest for Donald Trump. He first appeared in
04:39Butler, Pennsylvania, on October 5th, the site where Donald Trump survived
04:43that first assassination attempt on his life. But he's been stumping in
04:46Pennsylvania for him as well. And he's also used that opportunity to spread
04:51more falsehoods about the election voting machines that are used here in
04:57the United States, and to cast doubt over the integrity of those
05:00elections. He's also told people at those rallies that they should post
05:04anything that they suspect is being fishy onto Twitter as well. So he is
05:10using his platform on X, he's using the campaign, and he's also using the
05:15America Super PAC, which is a political action committee which was set up and
05:20basically funded by Elon Musk for Donald Trump. So far he's put $75
05:25million in that, as far as we know. And really they're responsible for
05:28running a lot of Donald Trump's ground game, the people on the ground who
05:31are knocking on people's doors to try to get people to turn out to vote. And
05:35he's also backing it up with a lot of money, other grassroots fundraisers
05:41and donors give to the campaign, have also been matched by Elon Musk at the
05:45moment, up to a value of $1 million, we're told. So he does have a lot at
05:50stake here, both in terms of the future of his companies, but also
05:53financially, he's at least in for over $75 million at this point. And
05:58while all of this is going on, Donald Trump has meanwhile started a rather
06:02unlikely spat with the British Labour Party. Yeah, this all stems from one
06:11activist who basically tried to get members of the Labour Party,
06:15volunteers to go out to door knock and support the ground operations of
06:19Kamala Harris in key swing states. That came to light and Donald Trump
06:23has filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission, saying that
06:26that is tantamount to election interference. He called it blatant
06:30foreign interference. Well, the British Prime Minister has brushed off
06:33those remarks from Donald Trump and said that these people were
06:36volunteers, and he said they were, quote, doing it in their spare time.
06:40The sources that I'm talking to inside the British government don't really
06:43think that this is that big a story. It's certainly something that's
06:46making more of a splash over on the other side of the Atlantic than here
06:49in the United States. But the main reason for that is because they say
06:52that there was no money that exchanged hands here. They were all
06:55volunteers who funded their own way over to the United States to take
06:59part in that door knocking, and the accommodation they were given was all
07:03from other volunteers from the Democratic Party as well. They also
07:07say this is something that happens quite often. Sister parties will
07:10help each other out. They've said that the Republicans have helped the
07:13Conservatives in the UK before, and it's not really anything new. They
07:17also say that they should look at someone like Nigel Farage if Donald
07:21Trump is going to investigate the Labour Party and whether they have
07:25been up to no good. They also mentioned that Nigel Farage has, of
07:28course, been on the campaign trail for Donald Trump over the course of
07:31the last decade as well. So they point to a bit of hypocrisy there as
07:35well. The government, however, also pointing out that there is a
07:38difference between the government of the United Kingdom and the Labour
07:41Party itself, and say that the government relations with both sides,
07:45the Republicans and the Democrats, remain strong. Fraser, thanks so
07:48much for that. That is our correspondent, Fraser Jackson, joining
07:51us live there from Pennsylvania.