Rumor claims Musk donated $800K to help storm victims repair their homes. Here's what we know

A rumor Facebook users circulated successful March and April 2025 claimed tech billionaire Elon Musk, an advisor to U.S. President Donald Trump, donated $800,000 to assistance tempest victims repair their homes.

Users shared and discussed this rumor arsenic tornadoes and convulsive winds struck the Midwest and South successful aboriginal April, portion millions of radical remained nether terrible upwind advisories for imaginable record-setting rainfall and life-threatening flash floods.

For example, connected March 30, the manager of a fashionable Facebook illustration named Sense posted (archived), successful part, "Elon Musk Donates $800,000 to Help Residents Repair Homes After Storms, Supporting Community Recovery." The station featured a nexus starring to an nonfiction connected a WordPress blog simply named, "My WordPress Blog." Other Facebook users besides shared the aforesaid rumor with posts including links to the aforesaid nonfiction published connected different websites.

The representation read, "Elon Musk Gifts $800,000 to Help Residents Repair Homes After Storms." (Sense/Facebook)

However, we uncovered nary grounds suggesting Musk — precocious oregon successful the past — donated the circumstantial magnitude of $800,000 to tempest victims. Searches of Musk's X feed, Bing, DuckDuckGo, Google and Yahoo produced nary credible results helping to corroborate the rumor. At the aforesaid time, Musk's companies and his instauration person made contributions to tempest victims, arsenic elaborate aboriginal successful this article.

The in-question WordPress blog nonfiction displayed signs of being generated with an artificial-intelligence tool, according to scans with the AI-detection websites Copyleaks, GPTZero, QuillBot and Scribbr. Someone besides created the supra post's representation with an AI tool. One of respective signs of an AI-generated representation is other fingers connected a subject's hand; Musk's near manus displayed six fingers.

The nonfiction featured nary accusation astir erstwhile oregon wherever Musk made the purported $800,000 donation, nor did the story's writer specify the radical who benefitted from the contribution. The proprietor oregon owners of the websites hosting the article, which displayed galore ads earning them revenue, sought to prehend connected and validate the beliefs of blimpish U.S. users. For example, the aforementioned Facebook relationship featured a leafage transparency tab identifying its manager arsenic residing successful North Macedonia — a state associated with disinformation efforts successful the 2016 and 2020 U.S. statesmanlike elections.

Other Facebook posts promoted akin made-up rumors perchance featuring AI-generated elements, including for illustration "Elon Musk's $300M Stunner: Homes for the Needy!," "Elon Musk's Ultimate Generosity: $55 Million to Build Homes for the Poor!" and "Elon Musk's Secret Plan: $5 Billion to Build Homes for Hurricane Victims!"

Representatives for SpaceX, Tesla and the White House did not yet respond to requests for remark astir this matter, specifically asking whether Musk donated $800,000 to tempest victims. A manager of the Sense Facebook illustration did not reply questions astir the intent of their efforts.

Musk's genuine contributions to tempest victims

There are genuine stories of Musk's generosity to tempest victims and different causes.

On Oct. 7, 2024, the New Orleans-based nonprofit catastrophe betterment enactment SBP reported receiving (archived) a $2.4 cardinal assistance from Musk's Musk Foundation to assistance tempest victims pursuing Hurricane Helene. The genuine $2.4 cardinal donation was triple the $800,000 fig from the made-up story.

Following a volcanic eruption and tsunami successful Tonga successful January 2022, Musk's SpaceX, a institution for which helium serves arsenic CEO, helped reconstruct (archived) immoderate of the land nation's net services.

Also, connected Oct. 26, 2017, the World Economic Forum reported astir Musk's efforts involving Tesla, wherever helium besides serves arsenic CEO, contributing (archived) its Powerwall artillery retention exertion to bring energy backmost to Puerto Rico pursuing Hurricane Maria successful September 2017.

Inside Philanthrophy (archived) published details of different Musk Foundation contributions, including $5 cardinal to COVID-19 vaccine probe and diagnostic tools, $50 cardinal to St. Jude Children's Research Hospital and $480,000 for h2o successful Flint, Michigan. Even so, The New York Times reported successful December 2024 that the instauration failed to conscionable a modular of donating astatine slightest 5% of its assets for 3 consecutive years.

The Musk Foundation and SBP did not yet respond to requests for comment, successful peculiar asking the instauration astir its contributions to tempest victims and asking SBP for much details astir the $2.4 cardinal grant.

Sources:

"About Us." SBP, https://www.sbpusa.org/about-us/.

"AI Content Detector." QuillBot, https://quillbot.com/ai-content-detector.

"AI Detector." Scribbr, https://www.scribbr.com/ai-detector/.

"AI Detector & Content Checker | No Login Required." Copyleaks, https://copyleaks.com/ai-content-detector.

Collins, Ben, and Brandy Zadrozny. "Troll Farms from North Macedonia and the Philippines Pushed Coronavirus Disinformation connected Facebook." NBC News, 29 May 2020, https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/troll-farms-macedonia-philippines-pushed-coronavirus-disinformation-facebook-n1218376.

Emery, David, and Jessica Lee. "4 Tips for Spotting AI-Generated Pics." Snopes, 16 Apr. 2023, https://www.snopes.com//articles/464595/artificial-intelligence-media-literacy/.

Fahrenthold, David A., and Theodore Schleifer. "Musk's Foundation Gave Away Less Money Than Required successful 2023." The New York Times, 12 Dec. 2024, https://www.nytimes.com/2024/12/12/us/politics/musk-foundation-taxes-donations.html.

Galeon, Dom. "Tesla Is Bringing Power Back to Puerto Rico's Hospitals." World Economic Forum (WEF), 26 Oct. 2017, https://www.weforum.org/stories/2017/10/tesla-is-bringing-power-back-to-puerto-ricos-hospitals/.

GPTZero. https://app.gptzero.me/.

Hughes, Heather C., and Israel Waismel-Manor. "The Macedonian Fake News Industry and the 2016 US Election." PS: Political Science & Politics, vol. 54, no. 1, Jan. 2021, pp. 19–23. Cambridge University Press, https://doi.org/10.1017/S1049096520000992.

"Musk Foundation." MuskFoundation.org, https://www.muskfoundation.org/.

"---." Inside Philanthropy, https://www.insidephilanthropy.com/find-a-grant/grants-m/musk-foundation.

Perry, Nick, and David Rising. "Musk Helping Restore Tongan Internet; Virus Outbreak Growing." The Associated Press, 9 Feb. 2022, https://apnews.com/article/spacex-technology-business-volcanic-eruptions-tonga-22f9378648323c0b5bfe6eeef774da7b.

SBP. "Musk Foundation Donates $2.4 Million to Support SBP's Multi-State Hurricane Helene Recovery Efforts successful the Wake of Epic Destruction." SBP, 7 Oct. 2024, https://www.sbpusa.org/blog/musk-foundation-donates-2-4-million-to-support-sbp/.