Donald Trump's interview with Elon Musk marred by technical issues

It was delayed by over 40 minutes due to technical issues, with Musk claiming a distributed denial-of-service attack.

X owner Elon Musk claimed that a distributed denial-of-service attack had overwhelmed the company's servers, preventing him from beginning his interview with former President Donald Trump. The conversation was delayed by over 40 minutes, with thousands of people trying to join the conversation complaining they were unable to listen.

Musk said in a post on X, "There appears to be a massive DDOS attack on X. Working on shutting it down." He later tweeted, "Worst case, we will proceed with a smaller number of live listeners and post the conversation later."
 

There appears to be a massive DDOS attack on 𝕏. Working on shutting it down.

Worst case, we will proceed with a smaller number of live listeners and post the conversation later.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) August 13, 2024

The interview finally began over 40 minutes late, with Trump discussing his survival of an assassination attempt at his rally in Pennsylvania. The conversation covered a range of topics, including energy policy, climate change, and immigration.

Trump accused Democrats of a coup to remove President Joe Biden from the ballot and took jabs at Biden's mental state. He also praised the Secret Service for their reaction to the shooting at his rally.

The interview was marred by technical issues, with Trump's speech sounding slurred at times. When asked about the issue, Trump campaign spokesman Steven Cheung said, "Must be your hearing."

The interview was reminiscent of Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis' botched launch of his presidential campaign, which was also delayed by technical issues. DeSantis attempted to kick off his campaign with a Twitter Spaces event with Musk, but the event was delayed by 25 minutes and marred by technical difficulties.

Trump's conversation with Musk was his first time using X in nearly a year. He posted a video featuring past comments made by Democratic rival Kamala Harris in support of progressive policies, as well as a video featuring news coverage of the federal search of his Mar-a-Lago resort and his indictments by the Justice Department.

Trump also reposted a message from his campaign's official X account promoting his interview with Musk, saying it would be "the interview of the century!"