Musk, who has been named by Donald Trump to co-lead a commission aimed at reducing the size of the US federal government, wrote on his social media pl

Outrage as Elon Musk claims ‘only AfD can save Germany’

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2024-12-21 10:00:06

Musk, who has been named by Donald Trump to co-lead a commission aimed at reducing the size of the US federal government, wrote on his social media platform X: “Only the AfD can save Germany.”

He reposted a video by a German rightwing influencer, Naomi Seibt, who criticised Friedrich Merz, the leader of the conservative Christian Democrats who has the best chance of becoming the next German chancellor, and praised Javier Milei, the libertarian president of Argentina.

The German health minister, Karl Lauterbach, called Musk’s decision to wade into the German political debate weeks before the snap election “undignified and highly problematic”.

Europe’s largest economy is expected to go to the polls on 23 February after the collapse last month of Olaf Scholz’s centre-left coalition. The AfD is running in second place in opinion polls. Elements of the party have been classed as rightwing extremists by Germany’s domestic intelligence services, and mainstream parties have vowed to refuse to work with the AfD at national level.

The German government issued only a perfunctory response to Musk’s post, noting that it had registered it, but a spokesperson refused to add any further comment.