Elon Musk can't seem to keep out of the spotlight.

In the past few months, Musk (the CEO of Tesla, The Boring Company, and SpaceX) has repeatedly inserted himself into the news cycle — usually through tweeting. 

At a time when criticisms of Musk's electric car company Tesla have ramped up, the 47-year-old tech magnate has publicly sparred with people on numerous fronts — a remarkable form of conduct for a chief executive, even one as outspoken as Musk.

See also: Elon Musk says he's going to try to stop attacking people on Twitter who criticise him first

The latest saga involved Musk's efforts to help extract the Thai soccer team trapped in a flooded cave, and his resulting feud with a British diver involved in the rescue whom Musk denigrated as a "pedo guy."

Here's a list of all the controversies Musk has found himself in during the past few months:

Musk said he would start a website to "track the credibility score of each journalist, editor & publication."

Wikipedia Commons

Musk suggested the website could be called "Pravda," a nod to the former USSR state-controlled newspaper, and would rank journalists on their credibility through a voting system. Musks' announcement came after Tesla popped up in headlines concerning company spending and factory safety.

He called an analyst's question "boneheaded" during an earnings call.

(Getty)

Musk, who grew increasingly frustrated during an earnings call in May, began to lash out at some of the people present in the call. 

After a question about expenditures, Musk interrupted a conversation between an analyst and Deepak Ahuja, Tesla’s chief financial officer, saying the question was "boneheaded," and moved on to other questions. 

He then doubled down on Twitter:

It was revealed that he donated to a political action committee dedicated to keeping Republicans in charge of the House of Representatives.

Although he has also donated to Democratic groups, Musk's $38,900 (R514,000) contribution to a group called "Protect the House" (in addition to donations of $138,900 to other Republican causes over the last year), seemed to contradict his professed desire to fight climate change.

Given the Republican party's historical hostility towards legislation to slow climate change, as well as other recent GOP policies, Musk was criticised for supporting a party that doesn't seem to align with his personal beliefs.

Musk defended his actions on Twitter. 

Notably, the Sierra Club came out and defended Musk's commitment to the environmental cause.

Musk insinuated that a reporter was complicit in insider trading and might be providing non-public information on Tesla.

Musk took to Twitter to voice his displeasure with Business Insider reporter Linette Lopez’s coverage of Tesla.

Using her Twitter handle, he directly asked her if she provided compensation to a source in exchange for information and whether she was complicit in insider trading and provided non-public information to short sellers.

(Business Insider has said it stands by Lopez's story and that it does not compensate sources).

Our invitation for Elon Musk or anyone from his team to further discuss what has been reported and the state of Tesla stands. 

 

Musk also went after Reuters and CNBC.

He criticised Reuters for being "relentlessly negative about Tesla," and publishing articles to "mislead the people."

And he went after CNBC, asking if viewers of the cable news network were aware of the "low ratings & extremely bad prediction records" of the analysts that appear on its TV shows.


He lashed out at critics of his involvement in the Thai soccer team rescue.

Elon Musk
Elon Musk/Twitter

Musk had a team of his engineers build a kid-sized submarine to help with the rescue, and he showed up at the cave in Thailand during the rescue operation.

The mini sub was never used, and when a British diver involved in the rescue criticised Musk for orchestrating a "PR stunt," Musk responded on Twitter by calling the diver a paedophile, in tweets that have since been deleted.

The diver, Vernon Unsworth, said he is considering legal action against Musk.

 

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