By Eric Vandenbroeck and co-workers

Elon Musk and the AfD

Along with QAnon, Elon Musk on Friday also voiced his support for Alternative for Germany, a far-right German political party with ties to neo-Nazis and has been classified as “confirmed extremists” by German domestic intelligence.

With the famous German publication Der Spiegel today refers to "Der Milliardär, die Influencer und die Rechten" (The billionaire, the influencers, and the right-wing). Whereby Der Spiegel and other leading German publications refer to the one-time attempted coup to overthrow the German government by the AfD and the so-called Reich citizens.

 

The AfD and Reich Citizens' Actions

The AfD and Reich citizens' actions led to an operation involving 3,000 police officers in raids, with initially 25 arrests, which took place in 11 of Germany’s 16 states and locations in Austria and Italy because of a plot to overthrow the German State. Or as The Washington Post reported, Germany Just Averted Its Own Jan. 6, and Maybe the Fourth Reich. Some suspects were heavily armed, and a few even had training in the German army’s special-operations units.

The men were said to have gathered like-minded people around them. Active or former members of the Bundeswehr and police were specifically addressed, who should organize themselves in "homeland security companies." Instead of reporting the coup plans to the security authorities, the accused agreed.

Several secret meetings were said to have taken place for this purpose. The "military arm" is said to have scouted out Bundeswehr barracks in Hesse, Baden-Württemberg, and Bavaria to check whether "troops" could be housed there after a coup. The group is also said to have discussed penetrating the Bundestag with a small, armed group. According to media reports at the time, electromagnetic impulses should lead to a power failure. A concrete implementation should not have been imminent.

The federal prosecutor explained that the suspects accepted the possibility of committing homicides as part of their plans for a coup. They are firmly convinced that members of a deep state govern the Federal Republic. Their goal was a "system change at all levels.

The right-wing extremism expert Split sayd that the plans of the AfD to overthrow the government  are serious and well-advanced. What is particularly shocking is which groups of people are involved. "They know how to carry out attacks."

A suitable 130 objects were searched by around 3,000 officers, including the particular unit of the GSG 9. It was the most prominent German terrorist raid in years. 52 accused were targeted, and 25 of them were arrested. These include former members of the Bundeswehr, a suspended police officer, a doctor, a lawyer, and AfD politician Birgit Malsack-Winkemann. Everyone moved into the Reich citizen and corona trivializing milieu. And all of them are now accused of forming or supporting a terrorist organization - and plans to overthrow it. The group's aim was a "forcible elimination" of the federal government and establishing a "new state order," said the federal prosecutor.

 

The Deep State Theory

At the time exemplified by Bundestag, Malsack-Winkemann, the movement  has also become externally politicized while sharing with the QAnon conspiracy theory the idea that Germany is held captive by the “deep state” a term frequently also used not only by Elon Musk but in particular also by President elect Trump.

The AfD, which increased its vote share in European Union elections earlier this year, is known in Germany for its embrace of far-right politics, including anti-Muslim rhetoric and a pro-Russian and anti-EU stance. Some of its politicians have also downplayed the Holocaust. A German Jewish leader said the party’s success in the June elections “should give all democratic forces pause.”

German courts have fined one of its leaders, Björn Höcke, multiple times for using the Nazi era phrase, “Alles für Deutschland,” or Everything for Germany.

In the video Musk quoted, the influencer, Naomi Seibt, said that the Christian Democratic Union’s Friedrich Merz had rejected the far-reaching government spending cuts favored by AfD, as well as Argentine President Javier Milei and Musk himself.

Bill Kristol, the Jewish anti-Trump conservative, wrote in response, “Musk endorses German neo-Nazi party.” Nadav Pollak, a former fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, wrote, “The AfD is one of the most extreme right parties in Europe, with many German political figures indicating it has connections to Nazism. This is completely messed up.”

Since Musk bought the social network X, formerly Twitter, in 2022, his statements and associations with ideas and figures promoting antisemitic rhetoric have rattled Jewish communal watchdogs. He has allowed back to the platform some of its most extreme right-wing users, including Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes. He has expressed support for Israel and said he regrets amplifying antisemitic posts but also has threatened to sue the Anti-Defamation League for tracking extremist rhetoric on X.

Most recently Musk endorsed an interview conducted by Tucker Carlson of the economist Jeffrey Sachs, in which Sachs said “Israel has driven so many American wars” and that the U.S. “gave over Middle East foreign policy to Israel a long time ago, not to U.S. interest, but to Israel’s interest. That is the Israel lobby, and we don’t hear questioning of this at all.” Earlier this year Carlson, a far-right commentator, interviewed and praised a Holocaust denier.

 

Reaction from Germany

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.

At a press conference in Berlin, Scholz responded indirectly to the post, saying: “We have freedom of speech here. That also applies to multimillionaires. Freedom of speech also means that you’re able to say things that aren’t right and do not contain good political advice.”

The German former MEP Elmar Brok dismissed Musk’s comment as “the world domination fantasies of the American tech kings”.

Late on Friday, after at least two people were killed and scores wounded in a suspected terror attack on a Christmas market in the German city of Magdeburg, Musk doubled down, tweeting: “Scholz should resign immediately. Incompetent fool.”

Lauterbach accused Musk of election interference and called for authorities to “keep a close eye on the goings-on on X”.

He said: “It is very disturbing, the way in which the platform X, which I use very intensively myself, is increasingly being used to spread the political positions and goals of Mr Musk.”

The most direct response to the Musk tweet came from Christian Lindner, the head of the pro-business Free Democrats (FDP), who was sacked as finance minister by Scholz over deep disagreements around fiscal management.

Lindner wrote on X: “Elon, I’ve initiated a policy debate inspired by ideas from you and Milei. While migration control is crucial for Germany, the AfD stands against freedom, business – and it’s a far-right extremist party. Don’t rush to conclusions from afar. Let’s meet, and I’ll show you what the FDP stands for. CL”.

In May, the AfD was expelled from a pan-European parliamentary group of populist far-right parties after a string of controversies, including a comment by the senior AfD figure that the Nazi SS were “not all criminals”.

The ID group, which includes France’s far-right National Rally, Italy’s Lega, Austria’s Freedom party, Geert Wilders’ Dutch Freedom party and Vlaams Belang in Belgium, said it “no longer want[ed] to be associated” with such incidents.

Musk has previously expressed backing for other anti-immigration forces across Europe, including the UK’s Reform party and Italy’s prime minister, Giorgia Meloni.

He has also previously voiced enthusiastic support for Milei, who in his first year as Argentina’s president has cut public spending and axed tens of thousands of public sector jobs, and plunged many households into economic despair.

Alice Weidel, the head of the AfD, who is standing as its candidate for chancellor, reposted Musk’s comment, writing to him: “Yes! You are perfectly right Elon Musk!”

Referring to a recent interview she gave on Trump with the news organisation Bloomberg, Weidel said Musk should note “how socialist [Angela] Merkel ruined our country, how the Soviet European Union destroys the country’s economic backbone and malfunctioning Germany”. She wished Musk and Trump a happy Christmas and “all the best for the upcoming tenure”.

Last year Musk criticised the German government and its struggle to tackle illegal migration, one of the main topics on the election campaign agenda. He has also fired off personal jibes against Scholz and his economics minister, Robert Habeck.

 

 

 

For updates click hompage here