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Elon Musk gave what appeared to be a Nazi salute at a rally at Capitol One Arena on Monday following Donald Trump’s inauguration in Washington. means for the future of the country.
“It was really important. I just want to thank you for making it happen,” Musk said of Trump’s re-election to supporters.
The billionaire placed his right hand on his chest before forcing his arm up with his fingers fully extended. Musk then turned around and saluted the crowd again. After the greetings, Musk told the crowd: “My heart goes out to you. It is thanks to you that the future of civilization is guaranteed.”
one pic.twitter.com/ISwJiM4EsH
-Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 20, 2025
News cameras caught a few people saluting anglesincluding one to the right of Mask posted online by Reuters. The salute was unmistakably similar to the salutes used by the Nazis in the 1930s and 40s.
Mainstream news outlets were hesitant to portray the salute as anything overtly Nazi-related. as NBC News “Musk then barely touched her heart before raising his hand and greeting his supporters.”
The New York Times live blog did not mention Musk’s greeting at all, instead noting that he “spoke briefly at a rally at Capital One Arena and promised to take DOGE, his cost-cutting effort, ‘to Mars.’
A Getty Images photo shows a caption on its website that reads“Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk gestures as he speaks during the inaugural parade at Capitol One Arena on January 20, 2025 in Washington, DC.”
The reaction online was complete shock with simple tweets reading “what” quite common. Others mocked Musk’s greetings with “thin.”
And Trump’s presidency begins with the world’s richest man giving a Nazi salute. pic.twitter.com/iGZtTB2UZB
— Mr. Beat (@beatmastermatt) January 20, 2025
Some people called this gesture the “Roman salute,” which actually predates the Nazi era. But since the 1940s, the gesture has been firmly associated with the Nazis who established the fascist dictatorship that killed 6 million Jews during the Holocaust.
This was noted by Philip Bump from the Washington Post Bluesky Anyone trying to defend Musk’s salutes as “Roman salutes” and not necessarily related to Nazis was not arguing in good faith.
“It was a Roman salute” is an updated version of “actually Buddhists also used the swastika.” If you’ve been using it since 1945, you know very well that the association has changed.
– Philip Bump (@pbump.com) January 20, 2025 at 12:56 p.m
Musk himself shared his entire video short speech On X, even as other users only focus on Nazi salutes.
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) January 20, 2025
Understandably, people on social media were alarmed by what they saw as the Trump administration’s embrace of fascism. But now that Musk has said hello to the worst regime of the 20th century, vulnerable people will be more concerned about how bad things will be in the days, weeks and months ahead.
Extremists on the Internet celebrated Musk’s greetings, mistaking them for Nazi gestures.
which, by the way, predicts 2025. The version the libs were outraged about was the fake middle version that we made them believe was a joke. https://t.co/OmmfIozKts
— Anime Kaiser Willy II (@praesto04) January 20, 2025
Even some extremists still called it the “Roman salute” while linking it to other neo-Nazi moments.
He has come a long way @RichardBSpencer‘s Heil Trump speech in 2016 @elonmuskabout the performance of @realDonaldTrumpInauguration Day in 2025
But after eight long years, the Roman salute is officially back in power pic.twitter.com/7kMducfgTw
– Augustus Invictus (@EmperorInvictus) January 20, 2025
But a handful of Musk fans insisted the billionaire wasn’t actually giving the Nazi salute, with far-right Ian Miles Cheong writing that reporter Aaron Rupar had somehow misedited the clip. It’s not entirely clear what Cheong means because everyone can see the greetings for themselves.
Left-wing propagandist Aaron Rupar candidly interrupted Elon Musk to make it look like he was doing the Roman salute while celebrating America. Here’s the part he left out.
pic.twitter.com/egdtyD4ewM— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) January 20, 2025
Gizmodo reached out to Musk’s companies Tesla and X, but did not immediately receive a response. We’ll update this post if we hear back.