At a rally following Donald Trump’s inauguration on Monday, Elon Musk—CEO of X, Tesla, and SpaceX, as well as a presidential adviser—ignited controversy by performing a gesture that numerous observers interpreted as akin to the notorious Nazi salute, “Sieg Heil.” Musk, who is also recognized as the world’s wealthiest individual, executed the gesture twice during his speech to the audience.
Musk commenced his address by expressing gratitude, stating, “I just want to say thank you for making it happen,” before biting his lip, hitting his chest with his right hand, and lifting his right arm upward with his palm facing outward. He duplicated the gesture after turning away, adding, “My heart goes out to you. It is thanks to you that the future of civilization is assured.”
The gesture rapidly attracted extensive criticism, emanating not only from leftist activists and Musk critics but also from segments of the right. During the confirmation hearings for Trump’s UN ambassador nominee on Tuesday, Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) emphasized the response from diverse groups. He mentioned that Evan Kilgore, a conservative political commentator, remarked on X (formerly Twitter), “Holy crap, did Elon Musk just heil Hitler at the Trump inauguration rally? This is incredible. We are so back.” Meanwhile, the Ohio chapter of the Proud Boys disseminated the video on Telegram with the caption, “Heil Trump,” and the white nationalist organization White Lives Matter shared it with the message, “Thanks for hearing us, Elon. The white flame will rise again.”
Musk, who has recently shown support for far-right political factions in both the U.K. and Germany, brushed off the backlash on X, commenting, “The ‘everyone is Hitler’ attack is sooo tired.” He subsequently shared visuals of significant Democrats, including Barack Obama, Kamala Harris, and Hillary Clinton, making unrelated hand gestures that he insinuated were being misinterpreted to create misleading parallels.
Adding further complexity to the situation, Andrea Stroppa, an Italian supporter of Musk, asserted that the gesture had historical connections to ancient Rome. On X, she stated, “Roman Empire is back starting from Roman salute.” Some of Musk’s followers echoed her view, claiming that the gesture was more about Nero, the notorious Roman emperor, than about Hitler.
### The Origins of the “Roman Salute”
Nonetheless, the assertion that Musk’s gesture was influenced by ancient Rome is historically questionable. Historian Martin M. Winkler, who wrote *The Roman Salute: Cinema, History, Ideology*, indicates that there is no evidence that the so-called Roman salute was ever utilized in ancient Rome. Winkler remarks that no Roman art, literature, or coins depict this gesture. “The gesture of the raised right arm or hand in Roman and other ancient cultures that is attested in surviving art and literature had a significantly different function and is never identical with the modern straight-arm salute,” Winkler elucidates in his work.
Instead, the gesture gained traction in the 19th century through literature, stage productions, and early 20th-century films that fictionalized aspects of ancient Rome. These portrayals later inspired Benito Mussolini and his Italian fascist party, who embraced the salute as a political emblem. As noted by *The Guardian*, the salute became a mechanism for consolidating Mussolini’s supporters and punishing those who resisted conformity.
Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party subsequently appropriated the salute from Mussolini’s fascists in the late 1920s, utilizing it as a representation of loyalty to their leader and his racist, anti-Semitic, and xenophobic ideology. By the onset of World War II in 1939, the salute was entrenched in Nazi propaganda and everyday life in Germany. According to the Holocaust Encyclopedia, “In public, ordinary Germans were expected to praise Hitler and give the so-called German greeting (‘Heil Hitler!’).”
### Modern Implications and Legal Restrictions
In contemporary times, the Roman salute is conditionally permissible in Italy but is outright prohibited in Germany, where it is deemed a symbol of hatred and extremism. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz addressed Musk’s gesture by stressing the boundaries of free speech in Europe. “We have the freedom of speech in Europe and in Germany,” Scholz commented, “but what we do not accept is if this is supporting extreme right positions.”
The uproar surrounding Musk’s actions underscores the lasting sensitivity concerning gestures and symbols linked to fascism and Nazism. While Musk and his supporters have sought to reinterpret the gesture as either benign or grounded in historical misapprehension, its connections to hatred and oppression continue to distress many observers.