Musk could influence political choices in Poland, survey shows
US tech billionaire Elon Musk could alter the distribution of votes in Polish elections, but often in a way opposite to his intentions, a survey has revealed.
In a SW Research poll for the Rzeczpospolita newspaper, published on Saturday, 33.4 percent of voters said they would be influenced by Musk's support for one of Polish political parties.
But most of them, 22.2 percent, said his endorsement of a particular party would deter them from giving it their vote. The remaining 11.2 percent said they would likely follow Musk's recommendation.
Nearly half of respondents, 48.2 percent, said they would be indifferent to Musk's opinion, while 18.4 percent could not say.
Men were more likely to be affected by Musk's words, with 35.9 percent of them saying so, as compared to 31 percent of women.
Musk has become an influential political figure since Donald Trump's election as the next US president. He has openly supported the German far-right party Alternative for Germany (AfD) and lobbied for the release of Tommy Robinson, the co-founder of a far-right British organisation English Defence League, who was sentenced in November 2024 for one and a half years in prison for violating a court order by publishing a video libelling a 15-year-old refugee at a school in Huddersfield.
Thomas Regnier, a European Commission (EC) spokesman, said on Monday that the EC would verify whether the Musk-owned X social media platform violated the European digital act rules by influencing European election processes.
SW Research carried out the survey on a sample of 800 adult internet users in mid-January. (PAP)
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