Neither SpaceX, Tesla, nor SolarCity were doing well and were losing money. Musk was living off personal loans to survive. But by December 2008, SpaceX won a $1.5 billion (€1.3 billion) contract with NASA to deliver supplies into space.

The publicity was a potential boon for AfD, which has been frozen out of mainstream politics in part because its leaders have downplayed Nazi atrocities.

AfD is also focused on ending Germany's policy of atonement for World War Two crimes. Its leading candidate for the European Parliament election resigned from the party in May amid public outcry, after declaring that members of the SS,

Musk tested the boundaries of foreign election interference, hosting AfD co-leader Alice Weidel for a livestream interview on X.