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Elon Musk took his endorsement of Germany’s far-right party to the next level on Thursday, hosting a live chat with Alice Weidel.
The 74-minute interview covered energy policy, German bureaucracy, Adolf Hitler, Mars and the meaning of life.
The world’s richest man unequivocally urged Germany to support the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) in the upcoming elections.
It’s the tech billionaire’s latest controversial foray into European politics.
This debate had a big rise because Elon Musk was accused of meddling in Germany’s rigged elections.
But the English-language interview arguably gave the AfD an opportunity to reach an international audience through Musk’s X platform.
Knowing her close relationship with Donald Trump, Alice Weidel made sure to express her support for the US president-elect and his team.
He insisted his party was “conservative” and “libertarian” but had been “negatively framed” as extremist by the mainstream media.
Sections of the AfD have been officially considered far-right by the German authorities.
A BBC News investigation links were found between some party figures and far-right networks last year, and a leading figure on the party’s hard-right, Björn Höcke, was fined last year for using a banned Nazi phrase, although he denied knowingly doing so.
During the interview, Weidel stated that Hitler had actually been a “communist”, despite the Nazi leader’s pronounced anti-communism, who had invaded the Soviet Union.
“He wasn’t conservative,” she said. “He wasn’t a libertarian. He was this communist, socialist man.”
He also described Hitler as an “anti-Semitic socialist”.
On other matters, he and Musk chirped, and sometimes laughed, about Germany’s obnoxious bureaucracy, the “crazy” abandonment of nuclear power, the need for tax cuts, free speech and “waking up.”
In a sometimes awkward and sometimes surprising interview, a surreal moment came when Weidel asked Mr. Musk if he believed in God.
The answer – for those who want to know – has been that he is open to this idea, because he wants to “understand the universe as much as possible”.
Despite the high expectations, that exchange was surely not on many people’s bingo cards.
The AfD, which opposes Berlin’s arms support to Ukraine, is running a second poll in Germany, with federal elections scheduled for February 23.
However, he will not be able to take power, because the other parties will not work with him.
That hasn’t stopped Elon Musk from calling Weidel “the leading candidate to lead Germany.”
He has justified his intervention by citing significant investments in the country, notably a huge Tesla factory outside Berlin.
And he has refused to call the AfD extreme right while previously tagged Social Democratic Chancellor Olaf Scholz, “stupid”.
Scholz, who sees his chances of retaining the chancellor as remote, later insisted he was “keeping quiet” about Elon Musk’s attacks.
But the billionaire’s interventions have raised alarm among some leaders, who have warned of misinformation and undue influence.
