There’s something hypocritical about Macron attacking Musk

Europe’s leaders rounded on Elon Musk on Monday as the American tech billionaire continued to air his views on the state of the Old Continent. Although Musk – who in a fortnight’s time will be president Donald’s Trump efficiency tsar – has focused most of his ire on Britain, he’s also endorsed Alternative for Germany (AfD) in a newspaper column ahead of next month’s parliamentary election.

Norway’s prime minister, Jonas Gahr Store, said in an interview that he finds it ‘worrying that a man with enormous access to social media and large financial resources is so directly involved in the internal affairs of other countries’. According to Store: ‘This is not how it should be between democracies and allies.’

Emmanuel Macron didn’t mention Musk by name in an address to French ambassadors at the Elysée Palace, but that’s who he had in mind as warned his audience to be on their guard: ‘Ten years ago, who could have imagined it if we had been told that the owner of one of the largest social networks in the world would support a new international reactionary movement and intervene directly in elections, including in Germany.’

Musk responded in kind, refraining from namechecking Macron but responding to his declaration on X with the remark: ‘Oh, like that time Starmer called [Donald Trump] a racist and said the British government should do everything to stop him?’

There are plenty of other examples of outsiders meddling in European affairs.