Elon Musk declares he ‘identifies as American’ – but people are quick to point out hypocrisy

Elon Musk, senior advisor to US President Donald Trump, has declared he ‘identifies as American’ – but people online didn’t hesitate to point out the hypocrisy in his statement

Elon Musk, senior advisor to US president Donald Trump, has been embroiled in controversy over his identity.

He boldly stated that he considers himself simply “an American” which triggered some people to highlight the hypocrisy in his remark. Born in Pretoria, South Africa on June 28, 1971, Musk landed in America with a student visa post his move to Canada in 1989.

Thanks to his Canadian-born mother, Maye Musk, he snagged a Canadian passport before heading to the University of Pennsylvania. It was in 2002 when he officially became an American citizen.

Musk, founder of Tesla and SpaceX, reposted a Tucker Carlson interview on social media platform X with Ernst Roest, a South African creative talking about serious issues back home. On March 4, Elon Musk tweeted: “Should note that I grew up as English South African, not Afrikaans, and consider myself to be simply an American. No hyphen.”

He added: “That said, what’s happening in South Africa is deeply wrong. Not what Mandela intended at all.” However, user rzep8 couldn’t resist a jibe at Musk on X, quipping: “So you identify as someone else than you were born as? Interesting.”

This jab opened the floodgates for more debate another piped up, going to bat for Musk: “He literally IS an American so…” Unfazed, rzep8 clapped back with: “He wasn’t born an American. He had it changed later in life.”

Another user chimed in: “African American.. That’s what he is now!” while another highlighted that Musk’s grandfather “was an American as well”, referring to Joshua N.Haldeman, an American-born Canadian-South African chiropractor, aviator and politician who was Elon Musk’s maternal grandfather. A different X user described Musk as an “English South African who naturalised to American citizenship.”

Another posed the question: “So you think the geolocation of your birth determines your identity? Interesting.”

Some agreed with rzep8’s view that it’s hypocritical for Musk to claim he’s American, with comments such as: “You came here as an adult. You can’t relate to the American experience that all peoples born and raised here share in common across regions and classes” and “If you consider yourself American why do you have citizenship in four countries?”.

Musk holds citizenship in the US, South Africa and Canada. Despite considering himself “an American”, Musk has voiced his concerns about South Africa.

The country enacted a new land law in January, permitting land seizures without compensation under certain conditions, as reported by BBC News. Last month, Trump halted financial aid to South Africa via an executive order, citing alleged discrimination against the white Afrikaner minority, descendants of Dutch and French settlers. On Friday (March 7), he broadened his invitation for relocation due to safety concerns to all farmers, not just Afrikaner ones, and offered them citizenship.