Elon Musk endorses Germany’s neo-Nazi AfD party

Elon Musk endorses Germany’s neo-Nazi AfD party

CNN reports:

Elon Musk is wading into more than just American politics, throwing his support behind a far-right German political party.

Musk, the billionaire Trump ally who is playing a public role in the incoming administration, posted in support Friday of Alternative for Germany, or AfD, after the German government collapsed this week.

“Only the AfD can save Germany,” Musk wrote Friday while re-posting a video from far-right political activist Naomi Seibt.

The AfD, which has recently seen its popularity swell, has touted populist and anti-immigrant “Germany first” positions. But the party has also been accused of resurrecting Nazi-era ideology and slogans. In May, a judge ruled that Germany’s domestic intelligence agency could continue to keep the the AfD under surveillance for the alleged threat it poses to German democracy, rejecting a challenge by the party.

Its youth arm, the Young Alternative (JA), has been designated by German authorities as a “confirmed extremist” organization. The party’s lead candidate in the eastern German state of Thuringia, Björn Höcke, was convicted earlier this year after breaking German laws against uttering Nazi slogans in public.

But the party has seen growing support. AfD recently became the first far-right party to win a state election in Germany since the Nazi era, though all of the country’s mainstream political parties have said they will not sit with them in a coalition, which will be necessary to form enough seats for a ruling government. [Continue reading…]


Politico reports:

Despite the newfound love between Musk and the AfD, the far-right party has opposed Tesla’s Gigafactory in the German state of Brandenburg, surrounding Berlin.

“We will not tear it down, but of course it is a problem,” the party’s front-runner in the state said during a debate in the run-up to the Brandenburg state election in September, in which the AfD finished second with over 29 percent of the vote.

The AfD is surging despite its growing radicalism and persistent warnings from mainstream leaders that it is an extremist, even Nazi, party. Growing support for the far right comes despite state-level domestic intelligence authorities classifying some local branches of the party as extremist organizations aiming to undermine German democracy. [Continue reading…]

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