In an unusual move, Italy’s President sharply rebuked Elon Musk for weighing in on Italy’s immigration debate in a series of posts on Musk’s social platform X.

In one of a flurry of posts, Musk wrote on Tuesday, “These judges need to go.” He was referring to the Roman judges who on Monday put on hold the government’s request to place a group of migrants in Albania as part of a new plan to outsource asylum requests to the Balkan country.

In a related post on Wednesday, Musk wrote: “This is unacceptable. Do the people of Italy live in a democracy or does an unelected autocracy make the decisions?”

On Wednesday, Musk’s posts prompted a sharp reaction by Italy’s President, Sergio Mattarella, who said in a statement that Italy “can take care of herself”. He added, “Anyone, especially if, as announced, they are about to assume an important government role in a friendly and allied country, must respect its sovereignty and cannot assume the task of imparting prescriptions.”

Musk, the world’s richest person who since Donald Trump’s election as the US President has also become America’s most powerful private citizen, has a history of weighing in on other country’s domestic matters, and has posted in favour of Italy’s anti-immigration policies. (On Tuesday, Trump named Musk to help lead a body “to dismantle government bureaucracy”.)

The statement on Wednesday was an unusual intervention by Mattarella, who is Italy’s head of state but not part of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s government. Among his duties, he presides over the high council of the judiciary, the branch’s self-governing body that ensures the magistrates’ autonomy and independence.

Critics of Meloni’s government praised Mattarella’s reaction and attacked Meloni, who considers herself a friend of Musk, for failing to condemn the entrepreneur’s intrusion despite having built her political identity around the protection of Italy’s sovereignty.

New York Times News Service