Elon Musk took his endorsement of Germany’s far-right party to the next level on Thursday, hosting a live chat with its frontwoman, Alice Weidel.
The 74-minute conversation ranged across energy policy, German bureaucracy, Adolf Hitler, Mars and the meaning of life.
The world’s richest man unequivocally urged Germans to back Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) in forthcoming elections.
It’s the tech billionaire’s latest controversial foray into European politics.
There’d been a considerable build-up to this discussion as Elon Musk faced accusations of meddling in Germany’s snap election.
But the interview, conducted in English, was arguably as much a chance for the AfD to reach international audiences via Musk’s X platform.
Knowing of his close relationship with Donald Trump, Alice Weidel made sure to express her support for the US president-elect and his team.
She insisted her party was “conservative” and “libertarian” but had been “negatively framed” by mainstream media as extremist.
Sections of the AfD have been officially classed as right-wing extremist by German authorities.
A BBC News investigation last year found connections between some party figures and far-right networks, while one leading light on the party’s hard right, Björn Höcke, was fined last year for using a banned Nazi phrase – though he denied doing so knowingly.
During the conversation, Weidel declared that Hitler had in fact been a “communist”, despite the notable anti-communism of the Nazi leader, who invaded the Soviet Union.
“He wasn’t a conservative,” she said. “He wasn’t a libertarian. He was this communist, socialist guy.”
She also described Hitler as an “antisemitic socialist”.
On other matters, she and Musk chimed – and at times giggled – over Germany’s infamous bureaucracy, its “crazy” abandonment of nuclear power, the need for tax cuts, free speech and “wokeness”.
In a sometimes stilted and, at times, surprising conversation, one surreal moment came when Weidel asked Mr Musk if he believed in God.
The reply – for those who wish to know – was that he’s open to the idea as he seeks to “understand the universe as much as possible”.
Despite all the anticipation that exchange, surely, had not been on many people’s bingo card.
The AfD, which also opposes Berlin’s weapons aid to Ukraine, is polling second in Germany, with a snap federal election scheduled for 23 February.
However, it won’t be able to take power as other parties won’t work with it.
That hasn’t stopped Elon Musk from hailing Weidel as the “leading candidate to run Germany”.
He’s justified his intervention by citing his significant investments in the country – notably a huge Tesla plant just outside Berlin.
And he’s dismissed characterisation of the AfD as far-right while previously labelling the social democratic Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, a “fool”.
Scholz, whose chances of retaining the chancellery look remote, later insisted that he was “staying cool” about Elon Musk’s attacks.
