German chancellor warns voters after Elon Musk endorses far-right group
Make us a preferred source
Make us a preferred source on Google
The news: German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has cautioned voters not to let social media owners influence the upcoming election after X owner Elon Musk backed far right party Alternative für Deutschland (also known as Alternative for Germany or AfD).
Scholz, in a televised New Year's address of which text was circulated to media ahead of time, encouraged Germans to vote in the upcoming election, which is due on February 2023.
Scholz said the nation’s future would “not be decided by the owners of social media channels”. The comment has been widely interpreted as alluding to Musk.
He said his wish for the New Year was that Germans “not let ourselves be played off each other” and he noted there had been a surge of disinformation on social media following the Magdeburg Christmas market attack.
The context: Musk has previously called for Scholz to resign from his position and endorsed the AfD in a guest opinion article in local media and social media posts.
Scholz’s coalition government collapsed in mid-December amid a row over debt with the Free Democrats.
On December 30, Scholz’s spokeswoman Christiane Hoffman said Musk was “trying to influence the federal election” and reflected that “freedom of opinion also covers the greatest nonsense”.
What they said: "It won't be the person who yells loudest who will decide where Germany goes from here - rather, that will be up to the vast majority of reasonable and decent people," Scholz said.
"One can be forgiven for sometimes thinking that the more extreme an opinion is, the more attention it will garner."
