Elon Musk makes private visit to Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp after endorsing antisemitic post on X

Tesla CEO Elon Musk made a private journey to the Auschwitz-Birkenau death camp in Poland Monday, a move that came two months after he outraged millions by expressing support for an antisemitic post on X.

The endorsement sparked concern among many American businesses, prompting several major media companies such as Discovery, Comcast, Lionsgate, NBCUniversal and Warner Bros. to withdraw advertising from Musk’s X platform.

Musk subsequently apologized for the post and is now making amends with the Jewish community. The SpaceX leader’s Monday visit to the former Nazi concentration camp is part of a ceremony at Auschwitz-Birkenau to commemorate International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which is recognized on Jan. 27.

The visit will be followed with an online antisemitism discussion hosted in Krakow by the European Jewish Association, also hosted by journalist Ben Shapiro, according to the Polish Press Agency.

It will include some senior European officials, “to discuss and find solutions to the astronomical rises in antisemitism affecting Europe,” the EJA said.

Poland’s Secretary of State Andrzej Szejna said Musk was invited to Auschwitz and the discussion because “everyone acknowledges what a great threat nationalism, populism, racism and all manifestations of xenophobia and hatred are to democracy, human rights and the EU.”

Musk found himself embroiled in controversy in November, after he agreed with an X user who claimed in a post that “Jewish communities have been pushing the exact kind of dialectical hatred against whites that they claim to want people to stop using against them.”

In a separate tweet, Musk also knocked the Anti-Defamation League, accusing the Jewish civil rights organization “unjustly attacks the majority of the West” despite their “supporting the Jewish people and Israel.”

The embattled X owner and his social media platform received scathing criticism from the Auschwitz Memorial, which said “leaving such language unchecked perpetuates the cycle of hatred and reinforces the idea that such hateful language is acceptable on this platform.”

Musk later apologized for the post, calling it “one of the most foolish things” he’s done on the platform.