Cofounder Jack Dorsey was reportedly whispering in Elon Musk’s ear that Twitter should be taken private

• CEO Jack Dorsey told Elon Musk Twitter should be private, the WSJ reported Friday.
• Other influential business people with libertarian ideas also encouraged Musk, the outlet wrote.
• The story cited “people familiar with the matter,” and former Twitter executives. 

Twitter cofounder and former CEO Jack Dorsey “whispered” in Elon Musk’s ear that the social-media platform ought to be a private company, and other billionaire contacts pushed Musk to pursue the takeover deal he ultimately made, the Wall Street Journal reported Friday.  

Dorsey, who stepped down as Twitter CEO in November, has publicly and heartily supported Musk’s purchase, saying that he is a “singular solution” to leading Twitter. 

Behind the scenes, others supported Musk’s Twitter interest, especially ones who were frustrated by Twitter’s content moderation decisions, the WSJ reported. That group was composed of wealthy and influential people with a libertarian bent and others who jibe with Musk’s strong anti-censorship views that they believe run counter to the way Twitter has managed itself thus far. 

Peter Thiel and David Sacks are apparently two of the people who encouraged Musk, the Journal said. Like Musk, Thiel and Sacks are former PayPal mavens who are often referred to as the “PayPal Mafia” because of the influence many have amassed in tech after helping to create the payments company. 

Musk’s relationship with Dorsey was evident over a period of time, the WSJ reported. 

Their online friendliness and general bromance began in 2016 and progressed from there, Insider has reported. 

According to unnamed former Twitter executives who spoke to the Journal, Musk and Dorsey apparently both felt that Twitter would function better as a privately owned enterprise and that it should be thought of less as a profit machine and more like a positive utility for the public. 

Musk and his associates have repeatedly expressed interest in replatforming people banned from Twitter or are annoyed that people were de-platformed, per the WSJ report. 

The outlet mentioned that Charles Johnson, who was banned from Twitter for raising money to “take out” a BLM activist, texted the head of Musk’s personal investment office, on the Twitter purchase and asked when he could get his account back. 

“Hopefully soon,” the investment head, Jared Birchall, apparently responded, according to the Journal. 

Musk purchased Twitter for $44 billion. His differing views on how to manage the platform, the possibility he will cut costs to cover the manner in which he financed the deal, and his tweets about current Twitter executives involved in content moderation, resulted in a pretty hectic week for the company.

But as the WSJ story noted, he’s none too perturbed by the controversy, and likely never has been: In 2018, in a now-public email, Musk told a PR consultant that he wasn’t going to tweet less. 

“Will tweet as I wish and suffer the consequences…so it goes,” he wrote..

Musk, Dorsey, and Twitter did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Read the full Journal story here.