'Only a matter of time before ...': Elon Musk on Germany's far-right AfD's strong gains

Co-leaders of Germany's far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla react to the first exit polls of the 2025 general election, in Berlin

Tech billionaire Elon Musk on Monday congratulated Germany's Alternative for Germany (AfD) for its performance in the recently held polls in the country.  The AfD came second among voters aged 18 to 24 with a share of support similar to its overall result, according to a survey by public broadcaster ARD and pollster Infratest Dimap. Only the far-left Die Linke party did better, with 25 percent.

The AfD scored its best-ever result to finish in second place with just under 21 percent in Sunday's vote, behind only the conservative CDU-CSU which came first on 28.6 percent.

Elon Musk took to X  to share a post and wrote, "Then it is only a matter of time before
@AfD wins."

Then it is only a matter of time before @AfD wins https://t.co/O8Ha8I2P4L
Elon Musk (@elonmusk) February 24, 2025

Meanwhile, speaking at a press conference, Alice Weidel of Germany's far-right Alternative for Germany said she had received a congratulatory phone call from Elon Musk, the billionaire CEO of electric vehicle maker Tesla and adviser to U.S. President Donald Trump.

"We are a people's party," Weidel said on Monday.

She also highlighted the fact that the AfD had done "very well" among young voters, hailing this as an "indicator that we are the party of the future". Weidel called for other parties to drop their so-called firewall against cooperation with the AfD. "They cannot exclude millions of voters. That is undemocratic. The firewall must go -- no functioning democracy has a firewall," she said.

Reacting over Alternative for Germany's performance, conservative election winner Friedrich Merz said Monday that the surge of the far-right AfD to 20 percent voter support was "the last warning" to the country's mainstream parties.

"This is really the last warning to the political parties of the democratic centre in Germany to come to joint solutions," he told a press conference.

The anti-immigration AfD remains a pariah for many German voters amid guilt over the country's Nazi past and has been labelled as right-wing extremist in some chapters of the party by German security services.

*With Agency Inputs