Elon Musk’s planned revolution in Germany may already be under way.
The Tesla Inc. and SpaceX chief executive’s enthusiastic endorsement of the far-right Alternative for Germany party, along with his free association with Nazi symbolism, are stirring up the campaign for next month’s federal election.
The results of Musk’s meddling won’t be known for sure until the ballots are counted on Feb. 23, and the chances that he can engineer an upset in Europe’s largest economy are distant. But the disruptive power of a multibillionaire who has U.S. President Donald Trump’s ear is unsettling Germany’s establishment at a time when the country is already vulnerable economically and politically.
Latest polls suggest the nationalist AfD, as the party is known in Germany, may be gaining ground on the mainstream conservative opposition as the ruling Social Democratic Party falls further behind. With his help, the AfD’s lead election candidate Alice Weidel now boasts more overall engagement on Musk’s X platform than any other German political leader, a recent study found.
“Musk is essentially operating as a kind of hybrid actor — he’s closely aligned with a government while not formally acting on its behalf,” said Felix Kartte, a fellow at the Mercator Foundation in Berlin specializing in digital technology regulation. By wading into German politics, he “aims to discredit and weaken Europe’s democratic institutions.”
Musk didn’t respond to an email seeking comment.
Over fewer than 40 days, Musk has called on SPD Chancellor Olaf Scholz to resign and proclaimed that only the AfD can “save” Germany. What began with a post on X led to a newspaper editorial, an online conversation with Weidel, a virtual appearance at a party rally last weekend, then another live video link-up that was planned on Tuesday at a business conference at the Berlin headquarters of publisher Axel Springer SE, whose CEO Mathias Döpfner is among Musk’s German intermediaries.
As discomfiting as that’s been for the German mainstream parties, Musk’s more recent flirtations with symbols of the Nazi era have turned frustration to outrage. There was the stiff-armed salute that’s come to be known as the “awkward gesture” at Trump’s inauguration celebrations followed by a series of Nazi puns making light of the furor on X.
Then came the weekend’s exhortations to Germans to put “past guilt” behind them and look ahead with pride in Germanic culture and values, freed of “multiculturalism that dilutes everything.” His remarks, beamed in to an AfD rally, even managed to impinge on this week’s commemorations of the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz death camp.
The immediate and overwhelming reaction in Germany has been shock and condemnation. Scholz called his interventions “disgusting.” Some corporate participants at the Springer event were privately keen to stress that they would attend in the morning and be gone by the time Musk beamed in later on Tuesday. Christiane Benner, the head of Germany’s most powerful labor union, IG Metall, said the billionaire’s actions were “unacceptable.”
Yet the flurry of appearances in support of the EU-skeptic, climate-change denying AfD make it impossible to ignore Musk’s interventions. And in uniting a German majority against him, Musk is effectively deepening the polarization in a society whose post-World War II success was built upon political compromise and the necessity for stable coalitions able to govern what is now the world’s No. 3 economy.
What’s clear is the outcome will either expose the limits of even the world’s richest person to bring about political change outside the US — or sow more German chaos that further undermines the functioning of the 27-member European Union.
“As citizens in a democracy, we have to stand up against this,” said Benner, whose union represents 2.1 million workers, including employees at Tesla’s factory outside Berlin that produces the Model Y. Benner has previously clashed with Musk over his efforts to bypass German worker co-determination laws, another bedrock of the country’s postwar consensus.
Musk’s preoccupation with migration is meanwhile gaining prominence with the conservative frontrunner Friedrich Merz floating plans to crack down on asylum seekers that won applause from AfD members.
While Merz’s hardline proposals are not due to Musk, but rather a recognition that German voters have turned against the welcoming stance adopted under Angela Merkel, it raises questions over Merz and his CDU/CSU bloc’s apparent willingness to cooperate with the AfD. Any such move would breach a longstanding firewall between the established parties and Weidel’s AfD that has ruled out the far-right’s chances of entering coalition government.
Helped by Musk’s amplifications and retweets, meanwhile, Weidel’s reach on X has been growing since Musk first posted his backing for the AfD, according to a study by the Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and Society. Her greater social media engagement is a key metric since most of her campaigning is being conducted online.
Musk’s support has additionally strengthened Weidel’s standing within the AfD, according to a person familiar with the matter who asked not to be named discussing internal party dynamics. Criticism from the male-dominated right-wing of the party has evaporated, and Weidel has successfully countered her party’s traditionally strong anti-American voices. She now presents the AfD as a “libertarian” movement with strong sympathies for Trump rather than a purely “far right,” nationalistic party.
Musk’s activities also pose a risk to his businesses, igniting discussion in Germany of coordinated efforts to shun X and his electric vehicles in Europe’s largest car market. Germany’s armed forces and Defense Ministry already suspended their X accounts earlier this month, claiming an increasing difficulty with “the objective exchange of arguments.”
Musk’s “gigafactory” in Germany is among four Tesla plants worldwide and one of just two outside the US along with Shanghai, yet it’s notable that Musk has had little to say about China’s Communist government.
With around 200,000 Teslas on German roads, the stakes are high as EV early adopters with aging vehicles weigh whether to stick with Tesla when their leasing deals expire or explore alternatives. Once dominant in Germany’s EV market, Tesla now faces stiff competition from German automakers like Mercedes-Benz and BMW which have expanded their EV lineups.
Polestar CEO Michael Lohscheller told Bloomberg News that his company hopes to attract Tesla drivers alienated by Musk’s politics. Small businesses including Sons of Battery in Pforzheim are capitalizing on the backlash with top-selling Amazon accessories like a bumper sticker reading, “I bought this car before Elon went crazy.”
“For Tesla in Germany, what he is saying damages the brand,” said Martin Fassnacht, Professor of Strategy and Marketing at WHU – Otto Beisheim School of Management. Early adopters, he said, don’t tend to share Musk’s views on Germany’s historical guilt, while AfD voters are likely sticking with diesel or petrol vehicles. “It used to be, wow, you’re a cool person driving that progressive car,” he said of Tesla. “That has changed.”
Musk’s influence in Germany is still undeniable. SpaceX has inspired a wave of aerospace startups in Munich, such as Rocket Factory Augsburg and Isar Aerospace, while Tesla’s bold moves forced German automakers to accelerate EV development to protect market share. Companies across industries have built their models around Musk-backed innovations, further cementing his impact.
To Joe Kaeser, the former CEO of Munich-based Siemens AG, Europe’s biggest engineering company, Musk’s meddling in Germany is less of a threat longer-term than the dangers posed by the unrestrained powers of the big-tech “oligarchs” supporting Trump.
“This is about world domination, and Musk is the one who is furthest ahead,” Kaeser told German news network N-TV. “That’s what worries me much more, this extra-territorial power that by the favor of the American president he’s projecting.”
