Elon Musk To Host Chat With German Far-Right Leader Alice Weidel, Amplifying Concerns Across Europe

Warsaw: Tech billionaire Elon Musk is preparing to host a live-streamed chat on his social media platform X on Thursday with a leader of Germany's far-right Alternative for Germany party, amplifying concerns across Europe about potential meddling by the world's richest man in the upcoming national election there.

Musk worked last year to help re-elect Donald Trump in the United States. Now Musk, in control of an influential social media platform that often spreads disinformation, is using it to endorse the far right in Germany ahead of its Feb 23 election.

“Only the AfD can save Germany,” Musk wrote on X on Dec 20, using the acronym for the party, known in German as Alternative für Deutschland. He later doubled down on support for the AfD in an article for the Welt am Sonntag newspaper, claiming Germany under center-left Chancellor Olaf Scholz is “teetering on the edge of economic and cultural collapse.” He will host a chat on X-Space at 7 pm in Germany (1800GMT) with Alice Weidel, a co-leader of the party and its candidate for chancellor in Germany's election next month.

The forays into politics by the Tesla and SpaceX chief executive is raising alarm across Europe.

In addition to endorsing the AfD, Musk has demanded the release of jailed UK anti-Islam extremist Tommy Robinson and called British Prime Minister Keir Starmer an evil tyrant who should be in prison. In Poland, there are concerns he could use his influence to interfere in the country's presidential election in May.

Musk's online chat will be monitored by watchdogs from the European Commission, which has accused X of violating the 27-nation bloc's sweeping digital rulebook for cleaning up social media platforms and protecting internet users from online harm.

Commission officials say Musk has the right to express his views but that the rulebook - known as the Digital Services Act - is designed to rein in risks that platforms will be misused to amplify illegal content including hate speech or election-related misinformation.

The commission has been investigating whether X complies. In preliminary findings issued last year, Brussels said the platform was in breach because its blue checkmarks originally intended as verification badges are deceptive, and because it falls short on transparency and accountability requirements. Regulators are still investigating other possible offenses.

In Germany, Weidel and AfD don't have widespread support ahead of the election, but the party has been rising in popularity as some criticism around it weakens.

Still, the AfD has been put under observation by Germany's domestic intelligence agency for suspected extremism, and mainstream parties have shunned working with it.

The AfD has strongly rejected the designation and portrayed it as a political attempt to discredit the party.

AfD was formed in 2013 and has moved steadily to the right. Its platform initially centred on opposition to bailouts for struggling eurozone members, but its vehement opposition to then-Chancellor Angela Merkel's decision to allow in large numbers of refugees and other migrants in 2015 established the party as a significant political force.

AfD has seen its support grow as a result of discontent with centre-left Chancellor Olaf Scholz's three-party coalition government. It hopes to emerge as the biggest party in three state elections in the formerly communist east, where it has its strongest support, in September.