Elon Musk’s weird gesture during a speech following the inauguration of Donald Trump has raised questions online.
The SpaceX CEO made back-to-back gestures, compared to a Nazi salute, during a speech in front of jubilant Trump supporters in Washington DC. Much of his speech was supportive of Trump’s vision for America with the tech billionaire taking particular interest in the president’s pledge to take astronauts to Mars.
“Elections come and go, some are important and some are not, but this one really mattered and I just want to say thank you for making it happen,” Musk told Trump supporters. He proceeded to place his right hand above his heart and quickly raise it toward the crowd.
Musk made the gesture twice in quick succession leading many on social media to brand it as a Nazi salute. A nine-second clip of Musk’s speech was shared on social media by journalist Aaron Ruper with the caption “um” and has gone on to be viewed more than 756,000 times. One verified X/Twitter user said: “Did Elon Musk just do a Hitler salute.”
X user Mordred added: “holy s**t, elon musk just did the nazi salute on tv… at the president’s inauguration…” X user wally b kleeposting addd: “Elon Musk casually doing a Hitler salute in front of millions. Right.”
Many of the clips posted to social media were edited to remove the context of Musk’s speech, which did not elude to Nazism. Others went on to downplay Musk’s gesture with one verified user noting: “Tell me that you don’t understand socially awkward people without telling me that you don’t understand socially awkward people.”
Jared Holt of the Institute for ISDGlobal, which researches extremism, hate and disinformation, said: “I am incredibly sceptical that this was on purpose. (Also that’s not quite how you do a Nazi salute!) Musk wants to stay cosy in this administration and this would be an incredibly dumb and pointless act of self-sabotage. Not convinced.”
Each of the posts claiming Musk appeared to have made the Nazi salute were seen tens of thousands of times. The Mirror has contacted X/Twitter for comment.
Billionaire Musk has become a controversial figure, earning praise from Trump supporters for bankrolling the president’s campaign and criticism from others over his support for parties, such as the AfD in Germany, which are considered far right. Much of the criticism against him comes from his frequent posts on X/Twitter.
Musk has faced criticism for boosting accounts on his social media platform X/Twitterthat have shared racist posts. Pro-Nazi accounts have flourished since Musk purchased Twitter in 2022 with accounts questioning the veracity of the Holocaust gaining millions of views.
The billionaire also allowed previously banned figures such as Nick Fuentes, who has shared anti-Semitic content on his platform, back onto X/Twitter. But Musk was slammed by far-right and nationalist figures among others for wanting to ease legal immigration barriers to the US.
Musk called for more H-1B visas to attract high-skill employees to the US, particularly to the tech industry. Nationalist figures turned on Musk claiming the visas allowed American businesses to avoid employing people born in the country or outright replacing them.
“There is a permanent shortage of excellent engineering talent. It is the fundamental limiting factor in Silicon Valley,” Musk said on Christmas Day last year.
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