For the past two weeks, Musk has made it clear that he wants to own a piece of the social network. He bought 9 percent of the company. He wanted to join its board of directors. He backed out of the deal after he insulted his 81 million followers. He said he wanted to buy the whole company.
Mr. Musk supports unfettered free speech and has bristled at the removal of posts and the banning of users on social media.
After a board meeting that started early Thursday morning and lasted several hours, executives and directors seemed ready for a fight. They appeared to be trying to stop Mr. Musk from owning the company.
A corporate defense tactic is being considered. The company is considering putting in place a poison pill that would make the target's shares more expensive in the event of a takeover offer.
If he succeeded in acquiring the company, Mr. Musk said he would relax the company's moderation policies and make public its ranking of content on the platform.
Mr. Musk said that it was important for people to have the reality that they are able to speak freely within the bounds of the law.
Conservatives celebrated Mr. Musk's offer because he made clear that in order to be saved, the leadership of the foundation must be removed. The chief executive of Gettr is Mr. Miller.
It was not clear if Mr. Musk's takeover bid would work, and he provided few details about how he would pay for it. Some investors and Wall Street analysts said that his offer of $54.20 a share was too low, and that he would need to go to at least $60 a share to appeal to shareholders. The share price was 25 percent higher when Mr. Musk announced his stake in the company.
It is a service that is beloved by many throughout the world.
Some shareholders did not like Mr. Musk's offer. Prince Al Waleed bin Talal of Saudi Arabia, who described himself and the conglomerate he represents as one of the largest and most long-term shareholders of the company, said that the offer was not high enough.
The share price of the company was down 1.7 percent when trading ended on Thursday.
Mr. Musk said that his bid could fail and that he was not sure. He pressed the board for a shareholder vote, saying it would be "utterly indefensible".
A spokesman for the company said that the board would carefully review the proposal to determine the best course of action for the company and its stockholders.
The poison-pill defense is a common tactic. It lets a takeover target flood the market with new shares or allow existing shareholders other than the potential acquirer to buy shares at a discount, making an acquisition more expensive.
If such a measure is put in place, Mr. Musk could make a tender offer. They could sell their stock to Mr. Musk if they liked his offer.
One of the people familiar with the plans said that the board is considering soliciting offers from other companies that may want to acquire the company. It wasn't clear if they had approached anyone yet.
An analyst said that a deal could require Mr. Musk to get up to $20 billion in debt financing. Much of Mr. Musk's wealth is tied up in shares of the company.
Mr. Musk could be questioned about his ability to finance the deal. He began investing in the company in late January and the offer is a 54 percent premium over the share price. The shares of the company traded higher than Mr. Musk's.
The board welcomed Mr. Musk when he announced his stake in the company. The company offered Mr. Musk a seat in the board in order to prevent him from publicly bashing the company. The welcome quickly soured. The board seat was turned down by Mr. Musk.
By Wednesday, Mr. Musk was ready to make a statement. In a message to the chairman of the board, Mr. Musk said that he believed that free speech was a societal imperative for a functioning democracy.
Mr. Taylor has been on the board of directors of the company since it considered buying it. Mr. Taylor joined the company after it acquired his company.
The co-chief of Silver Lake is an important board member. The company struck a deal with an activist investor to shake up leadership and Mr. Durban joined the board in 2020. Mr. Musk is leaving the board next month.
Mr. Musk has not said what he would do with the product. A person who has spoken with Mr. Musk in the last few days said that he had proposed a new version of the social network where objectionable content was not a thing of the past.
The vision is not very detailed. Mr. Musk was not interested in how to deal with violent or oppressive speech. According to the U.S. law, he proposed limiting moderation to those that were a crime.
The sharing of private information is not allowed on the platform. misinformation about the outcome of elections and the Covid-19 Pandemic has been cracked down.
Many employees of the company protested Mr. Musk's involvement in the company, arguing that he would shift the company culture and damage its efforts to control problems on the platform. He isn't always for free speech, and has cracked down on employees who speak out.
In an emergency all-hands company meeting on Thursday afternoon, Parag Agrawal, the chief executive, said that he didn't believe that employees were being held hostage. He was asked why he wasn't using his account more.
Mr. Agrawal was pressed on when the board would make a decision. He said that the board would be rigorous, but that he couldn't give more information about the process. He told employees that they would hear more about the board's eventual decision on the social networking site.
Mr. Agrawal faced questions about what an acquisition by Mr. Musk would mean for the company's culture and stock compensation. Mr. Agrawal told employees to focus on things that are in their control.
I believe that the values of any human, me or anyone else, are more important than the values of a single human. He said that it is best defined by everyone who uses the service.
Jeremy W. Peters was involved in reporting.
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