The world’s wealthiest free thinker and self-proclaimed advocate of absolute free speech claims he isn’t a Nazi, then why does the world’s richest man seem so eerily comfortable echoing Nazi talking points? Ah, Elon Musk - man with an unfortunate habit of making gestures that look like Nazi salutes but, according to him, totally aren’t.
When Musk’s arm shot up at Trump’s inaugural event, some concerned viewers saw historical echoes, but Musk was quick to clarify: he was merely waving like any normal billionaire would at a political rally filled with nationalists. Any nationalists, we wonder - or just white ones?
Musk's recent online escapades have included amplifying far-right conspiracy theories, endorsing Germany’s extremist AfD party, and waxing poetic about genetics - all while fretting over an alleged “white genocide” in his South African homeland. Coincidence? Or does his upbringing in apartheid-era Pretoria hold some clues?
After all, Musk isn’t just a South African export. He’s also a leading figure of the so-called PayPal mafia, a band of libertarian tech billionaires who, in a plot twist worthy of a Bond villain origin story, have become wildly influential in U.S. politics. A Mafia Built on eerily familiar origins.
Consider Musk’s fellow mafiosi:
Peter Thiel, the German-born venture capitalist who spent his formative years in Namibia (then South-West Africa) a country where, even in the 1970s, some folks still enthusiastically celebrated Hitler’s birthday and greeted each other with 'heil Histler' salutes.
Thiel, now a major Trump donor, has expressed concerns about democracy, such as his belief that women voting may be a terrible idea. Oh, and let’s not forget the Stanford student years, when he reportedly defended apartheid as “economically sound.”
David Sacks, another PayPal alum and current Trump fundraiser, was born in Cape Town. His role in the Musk extended universe is lower profile, but he, too, grew up in the South African diaspora before moving to the U.S.
Roelof Botha, a former PayPal CFO, also happens to be the grandson of Pik Botha, apartheid South Africa’s last foreign minister. He’s kept his politics quieter than the rest, but still remains in Musk’s orbit.
Among them, Musk holds a special place, not only as the owner of X (formerly Twitter, now a haven for reactionary right wing discourse) but also as Trump’s personal pick to lead his “government efficiency” task force. (aka DOGE) Nothing says populist billionaire like helping a former president gut public institutions!
Apartheid-era thinking:
For those inclined to connect the dots, Musk’s upbringing offers no shortage of material.
Elon Musk’s grandfather, Joshua Haldeman, had quite the résumé for a man of vision - if that vision involved dismantling democracy and replacing it with a rule-by-elite system that conveniently resembled fascism. As the Canadian leader of Technocracy Incorporated, a fringe movement that advocated for the abolition of democracy in favour of rule by an elite class of technocrats - a philosophy that, in retrospect, really helps explain Musk’s management style, his party had a taste for uniforms and salutes (popular in the 1930s - no?).
Haldeman managed to get his organisation banned by the government during WWII - partly because the group was suspiciously opposed to fighting Hitler. A brief stint in prison for publishing anti-war materials didn’t dampen his enthusiasm for extremist politics. In fact, post-war, Haldeman doubled down, leading a party that promoted the infamous antisemitic hoax The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.
When that didn’t take off, he packed up and moved to South Africa in 1950, just after the all-white pro-apartheid National Party government came to power (how you may ask? Easy when Black South Africans had no voting rights). Haldeman found the government’s Christian nationalism much more to his liking. Even Errol Musk, not exactly known for his progressive politics, found his in-laws’ views too much to handle and cut ties.
Meanwhile, Musk’s father, Errol, dabbled in emerald mining and has, at various times, both claimed to oppose apartheid and expressed reluctance about actual democracy. He apparently felt one-person-one-vote was too much, preferring a more gradual transition - perhaps one where white South Africans maintained just a little extra control?
Growing up in Pretoria in the 1980s, Elon would have witnessed apartheid at its most brutal. South Africa was in a state of emergency, Black uprisings were met with violent crackdowns, and white paranoia was at an all-time high. The neo-Nazi Afrikaner Resistance Movement - Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB) - was on the rise, proudly displaying their totally-not-a-swastika insignia while marching through Pretoria.
One would think an impressionable young man would have at least some awareness of why the Black majority was, let’s say, less than thrilled with the government. However, instead of staying and confronting these realities, Musk skipped out on the whole thing, opting to use his Canadian citizenship to flee military conscription and head offshore.
You can take the man out of Apartheid...
Musk’s obsession with self-reliance, his deep mistrust of government, and his growing enthusiasm for racially-charged conspiracy theories like 'the great replacement theory' contain alarmingly familiar echoes. How worried should America be right now, in 2025?
You can draw your own conclusions, but as journalist Phillip Van Niekerk (who, like Musk, was born into white privilege in South Africa) put it when discussing the impact of the regime of those who grew up there: “We all, by the very nature of our privileges and our place in the racial hierarchy, grew up believing we were the master race, even if we didn’t actively think about it.”
That’s the thing about privilege—it has a way of following people, even across continents. Musk may not be waving swastika flags, but his recent behaviour increasingly mirrors the far-right fear-mongering once used to justify apartheid. The same concern about white survival, the same deep distrust of democracy, the same love of “efficiency” over messy governance - it’s all there, just updated for the digital age.
And so, as Musk continues his transformation from quirky tech mogul to full-blown billionaire chaos agent, one can’t help but wonder: is this just another case of a rich guy being an edgelord, or is he simply playing the long game of a worldview that favours himself and his privileged cohorts?
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