Markets 
Published on
“She is France’s last hope.” It was with this message posted on X on Wednesday 15 July that Elon Musk expressed his support for Marine Le Pen, the National Rally (RN) candidate in the 2027 presidential election.
The owner of Tesla, SpaceX and the social network X was responding to a post claiming that voting intentions for the RN parliamentary group leader “have skyrocketed” in recent weeks.
In April 2025, Elon Musk had already voiced his support for Marine Le Pen when she was initially sentenced to five years of ineligibility for the misuse of public funds in the case of the National Front (FN) European parliamentary assistants.
“I hope and I encourage [Marine] Le Pen to overcome this persecution and to stand in the next presidential election“, he wrote at the time on X.
On 7 July, Marine Le Pen was convicted and sentenced to three years in prison, two of them suspended and one to be served under arrangements, as well as a 45‑month ban from holding elected office, 30 months of which were suspended. This was a ruling on appeal that allows her to remain eligible to run for president.
Accusations of interference
Elon Musk’s stance prompted a reaction from RN opponents in France.
“Like we say in French: Only fools never change their minds.“, Foreign Affairs Minister Jean-Noël Barrot quickly wrote on the same social network.
“The season of interference is beginning”, reacted Thierry Breton, former European Commissioner and former French economy minister. “Elon Musk is therefore backing Marine Le Pen. That is his right. It is up to the authorities to ensure that X’s algorithm does not favour any candidate”, he added, stressing that “the rule of law applies to everyone, without exception”.
“Take a good look at who Marine Le Pen is the favourite of: Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, the champion of profit at all costs, the man who flouts European laws and backs the most extremist parties all over Europe, the one who has made up with Donald Trump”, condemned Nathalie Loiseau, Renew Europe MEP.
On the left, it was Antoine Léaument, MP for La France insoumise (LFI), who denounced “foreign interference” and called on Arcom (the audiovisual and digital communications regulator) to act. “Algorithmic manipulation of the election is among the risks highlighted in my parliamentary report on the organisation of elections in France”, he wrote on X.
Elon Musk is no stranger to ‘interference’ claims
This is not the first time Elon Musk has tried to play a role in foreign politics. In the past, he has already sided with several nationalist or populist figures in European election campaigns.
In December 2024, he claimed that the German party Alternative for Germany (AfD) was the only party capable of “saving Germany”.
“Presenting AfD as a far-right party is clearly false if you consider that Alice Weidel, the party’s leader, has a same-sex partner from Sri Lanka! Does that remind you of Hitler? Come on!” he wrote in an opinion piece published in the newspaper Die Welt. The intervention sparked strong reactions across the political spectrum.
Elon Musk also commented on events in Romania. He described the constitutional judges who annulled the first round of the presidential election as “dictators” because of suspicions of Russian interference in favour of the nationalist candidate Calin Georgescu.
He also posed for a photograph alongside Nigel Farage, leader of the populist party Reform UK, and Nick Candy, the party’s treasurer, before the they revealed that the Tesla boss was considering making a donation.
The UK Newspaper, The Financial Timesrevealed that Elon Musk had also supported British far-right voices on his platform, such as political activist Tommy Robinson and Ashlea Simon, co-founder of the group Britain First.
Read the full article here
