2025-12-08T13:01:59.249Z
Elon Musk spent the weekend blasting the EU after regulators fined X over “deceptive” blue checkmarks.
He boosted posts comparing the EU to authoritarian regimes and calling for exits.
The backlash followed a $140 million penalty on X that Musk said was a form of political censorship.
Elon Musk spent the weekend bashing the EU.
The billionaire unleashed a barrage of posts on X, boosting claims that cast Brussels as censorious, corrupt, and anti-democratic — just days after the bloc fined his platform €120 million ($140 million) over the “deceptive design” of its blue checkmarks.
In one post, Musk asked followers: “How long before the EU is gone?” AbolishTheEU.”
In another instance, he backed a call for binding referendums on whether countries should remain in the bloc, describing it as a “good idea.”
He also reshared a meme comparing the bloc to the Nazi regime, to which he replied: “Pretty much.”
Musk repeated his long-standing criticism of European regulation, sharing a video of himself describing EU headquarters as a “giant cathedral to bureaucracy” and warning that the continent is exerting a “slow strangulation by overregulation” as he said innovation suffocates under Brussels’ rules.
“The EU bureaucracy is slowly smothering Europe to death,” he wrote in another post.
His comments came just days after the EU fined X €120 million ($140 million) for what regulators said were “deceptive” verification features that made it hard for users to identify authentic accounts.
‘”On X, anyone can pay to obtain the ‘verified’ status without the company meaningfully verifying who is behind the account, making it difficult for users to judge the authenticity of accounts and content they engage with,” the European Commission wrote on Friday.
The penalty followed a two-year investigation under the bloc’s Digital Services Act.
Musk has long accused Brussels of trying to “censor” X, and hours before the weekend barrage, he reposted US Vice President JD Vance, warning the EU to stop “attacking American companies.”
The European Commission didn’t immediately respond to Business Insider’s request for comments.
