Viewing Elon Musk’s recent forays into (electoral) politics in Europe primarily as a geopolitical wake-up call to European leaders, our analysis focuses on the promise and relative weaknesses of law and policy solutions as well as institutional arrangements the EU has put in place to protect European democracies from foreign interference.

I would prefer to stay out of politics,” Elon Musk told his followers in 2021, on the platform then known as Twitter. Plenty has changed since then. The world’s richest man appears to have a new goal: upending Europe.