Elon Musk Explains The #1 “Tell” of Those Who Are Guilty

In Shakespeare’s “Hamlet,” Queen Gertrude says “The lady doth protest too much, methinks” – implying that a character in a play within the play is overacting their denial of love, making her doubt their sincerity.

It’s become a commonly known phrase: “Thou dost protest too much!”

And Elon Musk just told us that’s the #1 “tell” he learned from his days of running PayPal.

Speaking about USAID and all the wild fraud he is finding, he warned that they would experience incredible opposition to their work, but he then said the ones who protest the loudest are often the ones with the most to hide.

It’s really common sense when you think about it, but he said he learned this lesson firsthand when running PayPal:

“One lesson I remember from the PayPal days: Do you know who complained the loudest? The Fraudsters. There would be immediate over the top indignation from the fraudsters. Normal people will say “I think there’s something wrong,” Fraudsters will come hot out the gate with fake outrage. They’ll claim that they’re a single mom with kids trying to make ends meet, but it’ll be some dude in another country scamming others. We’re going to see some pretty outrageous stuff from the fraudsters as we continue cracking down, they’re going to be the loudest.”

🚨ELON MUSK: "One lesson I remember from the PayPal days: Do you know who complained the loudest? The Fraudsters. There would be immediate over the top indignation from the fraudsters. Normal people will say "I think there's something wrong," Fraudsters will come hot out the gate…

— Autism Capital 🧩 (@AutismCapital) February 3, 2025

Watch/listen here:

Elon Musk Explains The #1 “Tell” of Those Who Are Guilty. @elonmusk pic.twitter.com/Jgd6oFMad9

— Noah Christopher (@DailyNoahNews) February 3, 2025

FULL TEXT TRANSCRIPT:

If we succeed—and I hope you know we will—I’d like to ask for the support of the American people because we’re going to get a lot of opposition.
Because, let me tell you, from what I remember most from the PayPal days is that you know who complains the loudest: it’s the fraudsters.
When somebody was trying to commit fraud on PayPal, we would see the most amount of righteous indignation.
It would be immediate, over-the-top righteous indignation coming from the fraudsters, not from honest people.

Honest people are like, “Oh, I think there’s something wrong with my account. I wonder what’s wrong—let me inquire.”
But the fraudsters will come at you immediately.
It’s a tell that someone’s actually doing fraud because the level of faux outrage is way over the top.
So we’re going to get a lot of that—many people claiming fake outrage, claiming that they’re, you know, a single mother with kids just trying to feed them.

Meanwhile, it’s like some dude operating a fraud ring out of another country, actually.
You know, that’s the kind of thing we’ll see.
So, I would like to ask for the support of the American people in pursuit of this goal, bearing in mind that we’re going to see some pretty outrageous stuff from the fraudsters as we crack down on fraud.
They’re going to be the loudest complainers.

To anyone in America listening to this: your support in pursuit of this goal is very much appreciated.
Thank you.

So wise!