Roth, who is known for his incendiary tweets including one calling former President Donald Trump a “racist tangerine” and another one declaring there were “actual Nazis in the White House” during the Trump presidency, was expected by conservatives to be fired with all the other Twitter top executives Musk got rid of after his takeover of the company.

“Dear @elonmusk, I want you to succeed at Twitter. This critique is based only on cold hard facts: You will never restore ‘public trust’ at Twitter when the guy in charge thinks 100,000,000 Americans who support America First are ‘Literal Nazis’ Not possible. @yoyoel must go,” wrote Newsmax’s conservative host Benny Johnson on Twitter.

But amid criticisms from conservative pundits, including Johnson, Musk decided to stand in Roth’s defense.

“We’ve all made some questionable tweets, me more than most, but I want to be clear that I support Yoel. My sense is that he has high integrity, and we are all entitled to our political beliefs,” tweeted Musk on October 31.

A day later, he wrote on the platform recommending users to follow Roth “for the most accurate understanding of what’s happening with trust & safety at Twitter.”

During the process of acquiring the company, Musk said he would push for freedom of speech on the platform, leading many on the right to believe that Twitter would be reshaped into a space that would fit conservative rhetoric better and that those previously banned from the platform, including Trump, would be re-allowed on it.

But this week, Musk said that content moderation decisions on the platform would be made by a council including “the civil rights community and groups who face hate-fueled violence.”

In a tweet, he wrote to Roth about meeting Anti-Defamation League’s Jonathan Greenblatt, Color of Change President Rashad Robinson, and The Asian American Foundation CEO Norman Chen to discuss Twitter’s safety and integrity policies.

“Twitter will not allow anyone who was de-platformed for violating Twitter rules back on platform until we have a clear process for doing so, which will take at least a few more weeks,” Musk wrote on Twitter.

This was enough to turn some conservatives against Musk.

“Why is it in anyway part of Twitter’s goal to ‘combat hate’? Or have anything to do with election integrity? This is not sounding like a triumph for free speech…,” tweeted right-wing YouTuber Lauren Chen.

Anonymous right-wing Twitter account Catturd wrote that it had been wrong about believing a Musk’s leadership would bring pro-conservative changes to the platform.

“I admit when I’m wrong and I was 100 percent wrong about @elonmusk changing Twitter. The new Twitter moderation council is just a bunch of far left fanatic groups who were never targeted here. No average Joes, no real Conservatives, no one to represent the PEOPLE ACTUALLY TARGETED,” Catturd wrote.

Attorney Ron Filipkowski, who monitors right-wing extremism on Twitter, said on Friday that MAGA is “not happy with Musk’s new content moderation board,” sharing a video of right-wing media personality Sebastian Gorka saying: “Elon, what are you doing? Are you serious? If this is your idea of being fair […] you’ve already failed.”

Newsweek reached out to Yoel Roth and Benny Johnson for comment.

Musk has meanwhile changed his Twitter bio from “Chief Twit” to “Twitter Complaint Hotline Operator.” On Wednesday, he tweeted about the fact that “being attacked by both right & left simultaneously is a good sign.”