The day after it was announced that Elon Musk was the new owner of Twitter , a man from Texas named Jim Schwertner posted a peculiar message on his profile: “Elon Musk, moves Twitter to Schwertner, TX. 38 miles north of Austin, in Williamson County, and we’ll give you 100 acres for free.”
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The town to which the man refers, and which bears his name, is an area of crops and land for cattle of more than 20,000 hectares in which several ranches are located. Cotton, corn, sorghum, rice and wheat are grown in that area of Texas and there is enough space to create a campus for a company like Twitter. The area is located in Williamson County, about an hour from Austin, which for years has become one of the symbol cities of entrepreneurship in the United States.
Jim Schwertner is the executive director of Capitol Land & Livestock , a company dedicated to livestock farming since 1946. What Schwertner is obviously looking for with his offer is to promote the growth of the region in which he lives, and although Elon Musk has not spoken to the tweet (in which it is not tagged) the idea may not be so far-fetched if we analyze that three of Musk’s companies have a presence in the state of Texas: Tesla Motors has its headquarters in Austin; Space X has testing facilities in the town of Boca Chica; and The Boring Company offices are located in the city of Pflugerville.
According to the site Austonia.com , Jim Schwertner declared that Musk is the best thing that has happened to Texas and that the arrival of Twitter could trigger economic activity in the region: “We think it’s a good idea, especially when Samsung comes to Taylor . I mean, this area is exploding and we want to be a part of this explosive growth.” In November of last year, Samsung announced an investment of $17 billion dollars to build a microchip factory in the city of Taylor, also in Texas.
Texas Governor Greg Abbott jumped on Schwertner’s offer, tweeting: “Texas man offers Elon Musk 100 acres of land for FREE to move Twitter HQ. I’ll declare it a ‘Free Speech Zone.’ Maybe we can rename Twitter, Texas. Think about it. @Elon Musk.”
So far Musk has not responded to the governor’s tweet either, but as the saying goes: asking does not impoverish.
Twitter’s offices are currently located in San Francisco, California.