Maye Musk described her son as a "genius". (File)
Elon Musk's mother, Maye Musk, recently defended her billionaire son and urged his critics to "stop being mean to him".
Maye Musk was interviewed as part of a BBC documentary where she described the world's richest person as a "genius". She also stated that because of his massive success her son "gets a lot of hate".
Her comments come amid a time when Mr Musk, who is also the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, has come under a barrage of criticism since his chaotic $44 billion purchase of Twitter. He fired almost half of the company's workforce and multiple high-level employees responsible for security and privacy.
His new $8 per month verification system has also seen users with a blue tick mark pretend to be major corporations, athletes, politicians and celebrities, making it increasingly difficult to tell at first sight which profiles are legitimate.
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Now, despite his huge success with Tesla and SpaceX, his mother told 'The Elon Musk Show' that "with those companies, he gets a lot of hate," as per The Independent.
Earlier this week, Mr Musk also drew the ire of US President Joe Biden, who stated that Mr Musk's ties to foreign countries are "worth being looked at" over national security concerns.
Mr Biden was asked about the Tesla CEO's financial and commercial connections to the likes of China and Saudi Arabia and whether he viewed him as a threat to American security. To this, the US President said, "I think that Elon Musk's cooperation and or technical relationships with other countries is worthy of being looked at".
"Whether or not he is doing anything inappropriate - I'm not suggesting that, I'm suggesting it's worth being looked at. That's all I'll say," he added.
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Previously, it was also reported that the Biden administration was weighing a national security review of Mr Musk's $44 billion takeover of Twitter, in part because of a key group of investors backing the buyout. The investors include Prince Alwaleed bin Talal of Saudi Arabia and Qatar's sovereign wealth fund.