When Elon Musk’s social media platform X launched a contest to promote its “Articles” feature, the guidelines were explicit: Submissions “must not contain political, or religious statements.”

But when the company announced the winners on Tuesday, the results appeared to contradict those rules. While the stated criteria emphasized high-quality writing and nonpolitical content, more than $2 million in prize money largely flowed to users ranging from popular right-wing influencers to anonymous accounts whose content mirrored the policy positions and grievances Musk has amplified since acquiring the platform.

The $1 million grand prize went to X user @beaverd for an article titled “Deloitte, a $74 billion cancer metastasized across America,” which aggregated data about government contracts with the consulting giant. Deloitte contracts were targeted for cuts by the Department of Government Efficiency when Musk was leading the Trump administration initiative. DOGE terminated at least 127 Deloitte contracts, according to Business Insider.

Musk personally engaged with the winner prior to the announcement, replying “Troubling” to the user’s article on Jan. 20.

Musk had also responded to a post by @beaverd claiming fraud at Minneapolis day care centers, writing, “Wow.”

The user has a history of racist and fringe posts on X.

In one post, @beaverd wrote, “i think america is ready for a shade of white lets send those somali’s back.” In another, the user said, “we gave multi culturalism a good college try it doesnt work. no more white guilt.” In December, Musk made a post saying “No more white guilt” as well.

In a November 2024 exchange, @beaverd weighed in after another user commented on photos of then-President-elect Donald Trump meeting with President Joe Biden at the White House. “Weird that he looks so happy while hanging out with literally Hitler,” the other user commented, to which @beaverd replied: “God I wish he was literally Hitler.”

The @beaverd account did not respond to NBC News’ questions about the nature of previous posts or if the prize money had been received. X did not respond to a request for comment.

Beyond the grand prize winner, the slate of runners-up and honorable mentions suggests the rule against political posts was selectively enforced. Many of the winning articles mirrored specific right-wing policy positions or culture war topics that dominate the platform’s current ecosystem.

One of the honorable mention awards was given to internet personality Kaizen Asiedu for his article “White People Didn’t Invent Slavery. The West Ended It.” Musk had posted in support of the article on Jan. 24, prior to the winners being announced, writing, “True.”

In August 2025, Asiedu had posted a video with the caption, “White people didn’t invent slavery,” to which Musk replied, “This is historical fact.”

Another honorable mention went to content creator Nick Shirley, who went viral after making a video with claims of fraud at Somali-run day care centers in Minnesota. His article submission was titled “How I Exposed Fraud, ended Tim Walz and proved MSM is dead.” The Minnesota Department of Children, Youth, and Families previously told NBC News it had visited the nine facilities referenced in the video and found them “operating as expected.”

Musk has posted several times about Shirley’s video and wrote in one response, “This is very common btw.” After being awarded $100,000, Shirley posted to thank Musk and X.

The pattern continued with the $500,000 “runner up” award, given to @KobeissiLetter for an article analyzing Trump’s tariff strategies. The user has had at least 11 public interactions with Musk dating back to 2023.

Venture capitalist Josh Wolfe also won a $100,000 honorable mention award for the article “The Arctic Smokescreen,” which attempts to explain Trump’s Greenland acquisition strategy. Musk has supported Trump’s plans to acquire Greenland, writing in a post earlier this year, “The people of Greenland should decide their future and I think they want to be part of America!”

Wolfe has previously posted in support of Musk, responding to a video post by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., calling Musk “unintelligent.”

“I’ve been critical of @elonmusk on tesla. I love Spacex, I like DOGE. I think AOC is a populist huckster grifter. Maybe she thinks attacking Elon will galvanize her base and help her raise money. I hope Elon gets her out of office,” Wolfe wrote in February 2025.

Two other winners, Ryan Hall and Dan Koe, were respectively awarded $100,000 and $250,000 for nonpolitical articles. Hall’s article focused on weather patterns while Koe provided advice on how to improve focus.

The competition won’t be the last time X will reward creators monetarily.

On Wednesday, the X Creators account announced a Super Bowl promotion to give away $1 million, $500,000 and $250,000 in cash prizes to three creators of video ads for Grok, xAI’s chatbot, made with the company’s video model. In January, the video generation tool attracted global criticism after an update allowed it to generate thousands of sexualized deepfakes of real people per hour, according to some counts.

Users have already generated ads for the contest containing racist slurs.

The winning videos will be will be “featured on X during Game Day.”