A rumor that users circulated online in March 2025 claimed tech billionaire Elon Musk announced he acquired the MSNBC cable news network for $900 million. Musk, an adviser to Republican U.S. President Donald Trump, purportedly purchased the cable news network — one that has historically leaned left and favored political viewpoints aligned with the Democratic Party — with the stated goal of ending its "toxic programming."
For example, on March 22, the manager of a Facebook page posted, "7 MINUTES AGO: Elon Musk announced that he has acquired MSNBC for $900 million to put an end to toxic programming." The post featured an image of Musk with the words "GAME OVER!," showing him holding paper reading, "Contract signed with MSNBC." Under the post, a page manager linked to an article displaying the same text as the post in its headline and claiming Musk posted about the acquisition on his social media platform, X.
Numerous other users also shared the same claim about a $900 million purchase of MSNBC as far back as Jan. 13 on Bluesky, Facebook, Instagram, Threads, TikTok and X.
However, Musk did not announce an acquisition of MSNBC on X or any other medium. Had he posted such an announcement, credible news media outlets around the world would have reported it as a major development. No such articles existed, according to searches of Bing, DuckDuckGo, Google and Yahoo. The users who promoted the claim were sharing a false rumor.
The article shared in the Facebook post's comment contained text resembling that of past stories judged to have been generated using artificial intelligence (AI). The AI-detection websites CopyLeaks, GPTZero and QuillBot all determined someone likely generated at least a majority of the text with AI. (Such websites do not offer absolute conclusions but instead provide data points in determining likelihoods of generative AI content.)
The fact-checking websites Check Your Fact and Lead Stories also reported the rumor as false.
Further, as ProPublica reported in February about a different post containing the same rumor and similar (or the same) imagery, someone used an AI tool to generate the purported photo of Musk holding the MSNBC contract. A user managing the Rediscovery YouTube channel previously featured the same picture as the thumbnail image in a Dec. 8, 2024, video (archived) titled, "7 MINUTES AGO: Elon Musk JUST Bought MSNBC." The video did not feature any mention of $900 million but did include AI-generated elements, as noted in a label applied by a person managing the channel. The channel's description did not feature any disclaimers about publishing satire, parody or any other types of fictional content.
While Musk did not purchase MSNBC, he had, however, posted about the news network before. For example, in October 2024, he called the network "utter scum of the Earth." Following Trump's reelection victory, he said, "Now MSNBC is going down." He also remarked on an article published by the satirical website Babylon Bee, reading, "Musk Announces Plan To Buy MSNBC And Turn It Into A News Network." Musk said of the satirical story, "Crazy idea, but it just might work!" adding a laughing emoji. The possibility remained that the rumor about Musk purchasing MSNBC for $900 million originated from the satirical story. Either way, again, the matter contained no truth.
A previous Snopes fact check examined a similar, yet slightly different, rumor from December 2024 also about Musk's purported aspirations to buy MSNBC.