US presidential hopeful Donald Trump’s two-hour, problem-plagued interview with Elon Musk on the billionaire’s social media platform X has been widely ridiculed and labelled a disaster.

After technical difficulties caused a 40-minute delay that frustrated listeners, the problems continued with Trump appearing to slur his words.

In what was again believed to be a technical issue, Trump sounded like he had a strong lisp throughout the rambling loved-up conversation with Musk.

The bizarre audio overshadowed the content of their discussion, which hit on the assassination attempt, immigration, “ssstupid people”, and the US presidential election being a fork in the road in history.

Instead of Trump’s return to X on Monday (US time) being a triumphant moment, social media users were distracted by the comical-sounding sentences coming from his mouth.

“Why does Trump sound like Donald Duck? This lisp thing is distracting,” said one X user.

Quipped another: “Is it possible because Trump was told that his interview with Elon wasn’t being ‘televised’ that he thought that he could take his dentures out and didn’t realise that then we could hear his lisp?”

Another X user drew comparisons between Trump and the Looney Tunes character Sylvester the Cat.

“Sufferin’ succotash! Sounds like Trump has a major lisp.”

USA Today columnist Rex Huppke said the interview was an “unmitigated disaster”.

“He sounded like a disoriented, racist Daffy Duck,” wrote Huppke in a brutal review of the chat.

During the interview the hashtag #TwitterBlackout was trending on X, with people calling for Trump to return to his own Truth Social platform.

Trump returned to X for the first time in a year on Monday (US time).

At the end of the interview, Musk endorsed Trump to be the next US president.

“I think we’re at a fork in the road of destiny, of civilisation, and I think we need to take the right path, and I think you’re the right path,” he told Trump.

The chat with Musk offered Trump an unfiltered chance to air his usual mix of grievances, personal attacks and overstated or false claims.

Musk let Trump lead the conversation and did not challenge Trump’s inaccurate statements, like the assertion that other countries were sending criminals from their prisons across the southern US border, or that bacon prices had risen four or five times.

Studies show immigrants, including those in the US illegally, do not commit crimes at a higher rate than native-born Americans.

The talk was Trump’s latest effort to seize the spotlight from his Democratic rival, Vice President Kamala Harris, whose 11th-hour entry into the race has galvanised her party and boosted Democratic fundraising.

Trump insulted Harris several times, referring to her as “third rate”, “incompetent” and “a radical left lunatic”.

But then he praised her looks.

“She looks like the most beautiful actress ever to live,” Trump said about a picture of Harris on the cover of Time magazine.

“It was a drawing, and actually, she looked very much like a great first lady, Melania,” he added, referring to his wife Melania Trump.

He also expressed anger that Harris had been swapped in for Joe Biden on the Democratic ticket.

“She hasn’t done an interview since this whole scam started,” Trump said, claiming falsely that Biden dropping off the ticket was a “coup”.

Trump had been leading Biden in many polls of battleground states likely to be critical to the outcome of the November 5 election, but is now trailing Harris in some of the same states.

A long-standing critic of electric vehicles, Trump has shifted gears since Musk’s endorsement. On Monday, he described the electric cars made by Tesla as “incredible”.

He also praised Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese President Xi Jinping and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un – all authoritarian strongmen – as at the “top of their game”.

Problem plagued

At the outset, many X users were unable to access the live-stream and Musk postponed the event.

The site showed the page was “not available” shortly after the scheduled start time of 8pm eastern US time on Monday for many users.

“There appears to be a massive DDOS attack on X,” Musk wrote in an X post at 8.18pm, referring to a type of cyber attack in which a server or network is flooded with traffic in an attempt to shut it down.

“Working on shutting it down. Worst case, we will proceed with a smaller number of live listeners and post the conversation later.”

He said minutes later: “We will proceed with the smaller number of concurrent listeners at 8:30 ET and then post the unedited audio immediately thereafter.”

Ahead of Monday’s event, Musk had written: “Am going to do some system scaling tests tonight & tomorrow in advance of the conversation.”

The interview was a fresh opportunity for Trump to seize the limelight at a time when his campaign is facing new headwinds.

His Democratic rival Harris has erased Trump’s lead in opinion polls and energised Democratic voters with a series of high-energy rallies. Harris’ momentum could get another boost from the Democratic National Convention next week in Chicago.

Trump’s first post upon his return to X was a video highlighting his claim without evidence that the four criminal prosecutions he faces are politically motivated.

He quickly followed with a half-dozen other posts, reviving an account that served as a main method of communication in previous campaigns and his four years in the White House, including his followers’ January 6, 2021 attack on the US Capitol.

Trump’s last X message before Monday was posted in August 2023 appealing for donations and showing a mug shot after he was booked at an Atlanta jail in relation to felony charges tied to his attempts to overturn his 2020 election defeat in Georgia.

Trump’s access to his account, @realDonaldTrump, was restored a month into Musk’s ownership of X after being suspended by the platform’s previous owners following the January 6 attack, citing concerns he would incite violence.

Trump frequently posts on his Truth Social platform, which was launched in February 2022. His posts there reach a much smaller audience than on X.

The interview on Musk’s social media platform allowed Trump to reach a different audience than the conservative faithful who attend his rallies and watch his interviews on Fox News.

Some X users also reported seeing advertisements pop up supporting Trump.

X and the Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request for information on whether there had been a pro-Trump ad buy.

Advertisers have fled X since Musk bought it in 2022. X earlier this month sued a global advertising alliance and several major companies, accusing them of unlawfully conspiring to boycott the site and causing it to lose revenue.

-with AAP