LONDON − He’s the world’s richest person. He’s extremely, doggedly active on social media. He’ll have a cost-cutting role in Donald Trump’s administration when the president-elect is sworn in later this month.
And he’s frequently bashing international governments whose politics he dislikes and praising far-right figures. Technology mogul Elon Musk has been using his X social media platform in recent weeks to unleash a torrent of criticisms and accusations aimed at political figures in Britain, Germany, and Canada.
Though he did not mention him by name, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said in a news conference on Monday in response to a reporter’s question that Musk and others like him who disseminate false information online had gone too far. Starmer pushed back on them for “spreading lies” that amounted to the “poison of the far right.” He said those doing so “were not interested in victims.”
Musk has been appointed by Trump along with Vivek Ramaswamy to co-lead the Department of Government Efficiency. Musk was a major donor to Trump’s presidential campaign. The two have been spending a lot of time together, including at Mar-a-Lago, Trump’s Palm Beach, Fla. residence.
In Britain, Musk has called for the release of Tommy Robinson, a far-right extremist who was jailed for 18 months in October for repeating a libelous claim about a Syrian refugee schoolboy attacking girls. Musk has said “America should liberate the people of Britain from their tyrannical government.” He’s accused Starmer of failing to bring to justice “rape gangs” connected to a series of cases from a decade ago when groups of men in towns in northern England, most from Pakistani backgrounds, were tried for grooming and abusing dozens of girls.
In Germany, Musk has said that the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, which is openly critical of Islam, has been accused of Holocaust minimization and opposes mass immigration, is the only one that can “save” the country. He’s said Germany is “on the brink of economic and cultural collapse” and that many Germans feel their concerns are “ignored by the establishment.”
Musk on Canada has called Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, who announced his intention to resign on Monday, an “insufferable fool” after he characterized Kamala Harris’ U.S. presidential loss to Trump as a setback for women’s progress. He’s praised Canadian political firebrand Pierre Poilievre, a Trump-inspired populist who’s railed against government bureaucracy and inefficiencies and claimed that a climate change-related carbon tax in Canada would lead to “mass hunger and malnutrition.”