Elon Musk’s social media platform, X, has initiated a lawsuit against several advertisers, claiming a “massive advertiser boycott” that cost the company billions in revenue and violated antitrust laws.
Previously known as Twitter, X filed the lawsuit on Tuesday in a federal court in Texas, targeting the World Federation of Advertisers and its member companies: Unilever, Mars, CVS Health, and Orsted.
The lawsuit alleges that the advertising group’s brand safety initiative, the Global Alliance for Responsible Media, coordinated a halt in advertising following Musk’s $44 billion acquisition of Twitter in late 2022, during which he implemented significant changes to the staff and policies.
Musk announced the lawsuit on X, declaring, “now it is war” after two years of attempts to be conciliatory that resulted in “nothing but empty words.”
In a video announcement, X CEO Linda Yaccarino mentioned that the lawsuit partly stems from evidence provided by the U.S. House Judiciary Committee. She claimed this evidence indicated a “systematic illegal boycott” organized by a group of companies against X.
Last month, the Republican-led committee held a hearing to examine whether existing laws are adequate to prevent anticompetitive collusion in online advertising.
The lawsuit’s claims focus on the initial period following Musk’s takeover of Twitter and do not address a more recent conflict with advertisers that arose a year later.
In November 2023, approximately a year after Musk’s acquisition, several advertisers began withdrawing from X due to concerns about their ads appearing alongside pro-Nazi content and general hate speech on the platform. Musk exacerbated tensions with his posts endorsing an antisemitic conspiracy theory.
Musk later accused these advertisers of “blackmail” and, using explicit language, suggested they should leave.
The Belgium-based World Federation of Advertisers and representatives for CVS, Orsted, Mars, and Unilever did not immediately respond to requests for comment on Tuesday.
During last month’s congressional hearing, a senior Unilever executive defended the company’s policy of advertising only on platforms that align with its brand values.
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“Unilever, and Unilever alone, controls our advertising spending,” stated Herrish Patel, president of Unilever USA, in his prepared remarks. “No platform has a right to our advertising dollar.”
