13 times Elon Musk meddled in politics

 

13 times Elon Musk meddled in politics

 

The X owner and Donald Trump pick will never, ever stop posting — governments be damned.

 

January 8, 2025 4:00 am CET

By Noah Keate

https://www.politico.eu/article/elon-musk-politics-uk-republicans-x-owner-donald-trump-prison/

 

LONDON — Elon Musk just can’t help himself.

 

When he’s not beefing with top Republicans, the X owner and Donald Trump ally likes to spend his time sticking his oar into the affairs of overseas governments — to much annoyance.

 

Here are 13 times (unlucky for some) the tech billionaire picked a fight with politicians outside the United States.

 

What began as a top relationship between fellow tech bros Elon Musk and Rishi Sunak soon went south when Keir Starmer succeeded Sunak as U.K. prime minister. Just weeks into Labour’s administration, Musk claimed “civil war is inevitable” in the country — and things kept sliding from there.

 

Musk claimed Britain was a “tyrannical police state;” branded Starmer “twotierkeir” over the policing of far-right protests; warned the U.K. was going “full Stalin” by tweaking inheritance tax rules for farmers; called for the prime minister to be imprisoned over the state’s response to child sexual exploitation; and branded Starmer’s safeguarding minister a “rape genocide apologist.”

 

Otherwise it’s been plain sailing.

 

Starmer could perhaps have had a word of warning from Scotland’s Humza Yousaf. The ex-first minister, one of Britain’s most prominent Muslim politicians, was branded “super-super racist” by Musk in response to a speech Yousaf made about structural racism in Scotland. “Scotland gave him everything and yet he loathes white people,” Musk charged.

 

Musk even found time to fall out with a supposed ally. This past weekend he called for Reform UK leader Nigel Farage — a top Trump acolyte — to be replaced atop the party because he’s not sufficiently keen on jailed far-right agitator Tommy Robinson. Farage insists they can still be pals.

 

With Germans due to vote next month, the tech billionaire caused a major stir by throwing his weight behind the far-right Alternative for Germany party, claiming only the AfD “can save Germany.” That drew short shrift from embattled incumbent Chancellor Olaf Scholz, who claimed Musk’s prized free speech means “you can say things that are not right and do not contain good political advice.”

 

Election frontrunner Friedrich Merz also laid into Musk, calling the X owner’s comments “intrusive and presumptuous.”

 

Musk is now planning a discussion on his X platform with Alice Weidel, the AfD’s pick for chancellor. Scholz’s latest approach to Musk? “Don’t feed the troll.”

 

Ukraine

Musk’s definitely-fully-thought-through plan for solving the war in Ukraine has received a … mixed reception. In October 2022 he used the classic military strategy of a poll on X to canvass random users on the viability of holding elections in regions of the country occupied by Russia.

 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was not impressed, responding sarcastically with a poll on whether people prefer a Musk who supports Russia or Ukraine. A call between Trump and Zelenskyy after the U.S. election — with Musk listening in — won’t have been at all awkward then.

 

Canada

Newsflash: One Musk prediction turned out to be correct. The Tesla tech boss predicted last November that Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau “will be gone in the upcoming election.” Trudeau, as it turns out, won’t even make it to election day, resigning as PM on Monday after more than nine years in power.

 

Musk won’t miss him, labelling the outgoing Liberal Party leader “an insufferable tool” after he called Trump’s re-election a setback for women’s rights.

 

Australia

Even politicos down under can’t escape Musk’s hot takes, although at least these were on areas you might expect a tech entrepreneur to have a view.

 

Musk hit out at plans to ban children from social media platforms, calling it a “backdoor way to control access to the internet,” and disparaging the Aussie government as “fascists” for pushing legislation aiming to regulate misinformation on social media.

 

The government rejected his criticism, with one minister saying their job is “not to come up with a social media policy to please Elon Musk.” Don’t tell him that!

 

Brazil

Brazil went further than Australia and temporarily blocked Musk’s X altogether last year after he refused to ban accounts that had spread misinformation about the 2022 Brazilian presidential election. Opponents of the ban said the accounts were targeted for political reasons.

 

In retaliation, Musk fired X’s Brazilian staff and shut the firm’s local office — though the ban was lifted after X paid £3.8 million in fines (chickenfeed for the world’s richest man) and blocked the accounts in question.

 

An officially endorsed X account still exists to document “unlawful directives issued by Alexandre de Moraes,” the judge who ordered the social media shutdown. Musk has posted memes of de Moraes as Voldemort and compared him to Darth Vader.

 

Ireland/Northern Ireland

Musk’s posts are at least creative.

 

Happily wading into one of the most sensitive conflicts of modern times, Musk mocked the Irish Republican Army (IRA), calling it “as scary as a plush toy” for all that it used to be “so hardcore.”

 

He also praised an anti-immigration rally in Dublin, claiming: “The people of Ireland are standing up for themselves!”

 

Romania

The canceled Romanian presidential election — shelved as authorities cited “aggressive” hybrid attacks from Russia — drew Musk’s ire. “How can a judge cancel an election and not be considered a dictator?” he fumed. Musk’s new boss, to be sure, would never quibble with something as sacred as an election.

 

Denmark/Greenland

Trump has for years expressed an interest in acquiring the Danish overseas territory of Greenland, which he calls an “absolutely necessity” for American security.

 

Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen is, unsurprisingly, not a huge fan of this idea. On Tuesday, with Trump’s son Donald Jr. visiting the island, she said that “Greenland belongs to the Greenlanders.”

 

Musk had his say on X too, writing: “If the people of Greenland want to be part of America, which I hope they do, they would be most welcome!”

 

Netherlands

Musk’s preference for hanging out with hard-right figures was on show yet again during his chinwag with Geert Wilders, the Dutch politician who has long campaigned on an anti-Islam and anti-migration platform.

 

The X owner highlighted the country’s low birth rate and claimed that “the Dutch nation will die out by its own hand.” With 12 children of his own, Musk should have plenty of useful tips for the demure Dutch.

 

Venezuela

Venezuela’s firebrand left-wing President Nicolás Maduro banned X for 10 days last August after coming to blows with Musk. The X owner branded Maduro a “dictator” and a “clown” and accused him of “major election fraud.” To be fair, that last bit is also the assessment of the current U.S. administration.

 

 

In his pre-X era, Elon Musk mocked then-Finnish PM Sanna Marin for visiting a nightclub in late 2021 when exposed to someone with Covid-19. | Markku Ulander and Lehtikuva/Getty Images

 

Finland

In his pre-X era, Musk mocked then-Finnish PM Sanna Marin for visiting a nightclub in late 2021 after being exposed to someone with Covid-19. His meme included a picture of two young adults in a nightclub with the captions: “So what do you do for a living? I am the Prime Minister of Finland.” He followed up with a post saying Marin “seems cool,” prompting the then-PM to talk up her country’s climate cred.

 

The EU

As if going after one country at a time wasn’t enough of a challenge, Musk squabbled with the entire European Union.

 

Back in October he got into an online spat with outgoing European Commission Vice President Věra Jourová, calling her “the epitome of banal, bureaucratic evil.” That was after she dubbed him a “promoter of evil” amid a host of regulatory fights over X.

 

Musk has also attacked the newly appointed European Commission as “undemocratic” and said the European Parliament should “not give up authority” to it.

 

His decision to host German far-right leader Weidel on a livestream is already drawing furious reactions from European Union leaders and lawmakers — and the Commission is under pressure to throw its hefty digital rulebook at him.

 

One final note to readers: You can always log off and go outside for a bit.