European Union (EU) officials harshly criticized tycoon Elon Musk’s comments that compared the community bloc with Nazi Germany. The controversy arose after the EU imposed a fine of 120 million euros on the social network X (formerly Twitter) for violating the Digital Services Regulation. The owner of X and Tesla responded with a meme that placed the EU at the level of the Third Reich regime, a comparison immediately rejected by Brussels.
The fine imposed on X results from violations of the design of “blue marks”which the Commission considers to be misleading and capable of exposing users to impersonation. Musk reacted immediately, classifying the decision as “bullshit” and even suggesting the disappearance of the EU. The businessman also supported the holding of national referendums on remaining in the bloc.
The day after the fine was announced, X’s product director, Nikita Bier, revealed that the platform had closed the European Commission’s own advertising account. Bier alleges that Brussels accessed an inactive account to exploit an internal flaw – something the Commission denies, ensuring that it always uses official tools and within the rules.
Thomas Regnier, spokesperson for Technological Sovereignty, Defense, Space, Research and Innovation at the European Commission, assured at a press conference on Friday that the decision “has nothing to do with content moderation”.
According to him, it is the platforms themselves that make the vast majority of moderation decisions – including more than 118 million on Instagram, 413 million on Facebook and 616 thousand on X, this year alone in the EU – and added that the Commission is only applying European legislation “through due process”.
This is not the first time Musk has confronted the EU. The businessman has described Brussels as a “temple of bureaucracy” that “stifles Europe”, accusing the bloc of regulatory excess and “attacking American companies”. In recent weeks, it has amplified criticism from US politicians and classified European transparency rules as forms of censorship.
The comparison with Nazism provoked particular indignation in Europe. Nazi Germany (1933–1945) was a brutal totalitarian state that abolished civil rights and destroyed German democracy through repressive laws. Criticism, satire and jokes about the Führer or the Nazi Party could lead to arrest, interrogation by the Gestapo and even sentences in concentration camps.
The Holocaust corresponded to the systematic extermination of six million Jews and the murder of millions of other civilians, including political opponents, gypsies, people with disabilities and prisoners of war. The regime’s ideology was based on racism, militarism and total suppression of the opposition. Observers stress that the EU’s open and democratic structure is fundamentally different from the dictatorial machine created by Nazi Germany.
EU was born to guarantee peace and democracy
What would later be called the European Union was created in 1957 to ensure lasting peace between former adversaries, evolving as a democratic union based on the rule of law and respect for fundamental rights. The European Parliament is directly elected by citizens, national governments report to their respective parliaments and the Court of Justice ensures compliance with common standards.
In the face of controversy, European officials insist that equating the bloc with a totalitarian regime is a serious historical distortion and a gratuitous provocation, stressing that the EU was built on the basis of cooperation, freedom and human rights and that Musk’s comparison does not stand up to any factual scrutiny.