It is not very clear to me what strategy the Romanian authorities have regarding TikTok for the next few months before the presidential elections. There are almost four crucial months in which we’ll be under fire during the electoral campaign.
The public mood will become clear between January and May, and there is already a solid and toxic background, which started in the weeks and months preceding November 24 (Eds: first round of presidential elections), and will be converted into concrete votes and results in the May 4-18 two-round presidential ballot Votes and results that will define Romania’s path for years, perhaps for decades to come.
At the moment, it’s clear that TikTok is a prolific virtual space for pro-Russian forces in the public arena.
This was also evident during the pro-Georgescu rally on January 10, when large number of followers fired by the flame of the live videos made by all kinds of dodgy influencers and no-name useful idiots crowded on to the TikTok platform.
But no less mysterious is to what extent the Romanian state, which already has a huge problem with TikTok, will be able to address a possible shock intervention from X as well, through the direct involvement of the owner of this platform, mega and MAGA billionaire Elon Musk.
The question is pertinent for two reasons:
One. Elon Musk is showing a growing interest in supporting far-right and Russia-friendly political forces on the continent. That’s crystal clear as far as Britain and Germany are concerned. France, for its part, has raised the issue of a possible Musk interface on the political-electoral scene in Paris to the highest level.
Two. Elon Musk already has form as far as Romania is concerned. In December , he touched on the annulment of the elections striking a perfect Georgescu-Putinist note, accusing the Constitutional Court of dictatorship and also minimizing Russia’s involvement in Romania’s electoral process. And now, in January, he has distributed fake news – for the sake of freedom of expression, right? that is meant to put both Romania and the European Commission in a bad light.
Musk’s interventions in countries such as Germany and the United Kingdom, and his interventions so far on the situation in Romania, project the likelihood of a fairly probable offensive in the true sense of the word, which the billionaire can also launch in Romania’s cyber-political-electoral space.
And if this is the case, the situation will precipitate as we approach the elections. As is happening in Germany, where there are parliamentary elections for a new chancellor and a new government at the end of February, which is much earlier than Romania. Just the other day, Elon Musk took a massive step forward, personally interviewing the leader of the far-right AfD party. Previously, Musk had made a name for himself by personal attacks against the incumbent chancellor and the incumbent president y (of course, his range of intervention in the German elections was much wider, these are just two glaring examples).
So:
- Do the governing coalition leaders in Bucharest have any idea how they will handle the Musk problem if it gets worse as the presidential election approaches?
- Do the state institutions have any idea what they can do in such a scenario?
- Is Romanian diplomacy prepared for the unequal fight with such a character who, in addition to his huge informal power, after January 20 will also have an official position in the Washington administration, a detail that will only complicate things diplomatically?
In which case:
- In the case that Bucharest has not yet started to write contingency plans on the subject of Musk, is it still willing to think at least from now on about such a scenario? Is it also willing and able to outline action plans either to stop an overwhelming fire from happening, or, in case it will not be able to prevent it, to fight back in a coherent and effective manner?
I know, it’s a problem that is very difficult at least and very, very difficult at worse, but if nobody in Bucharest is already working on this or at least if they don’t start working now, what we experienced on November 24, 2024 could be a more trifle compared to what could happen on May 4 and 18.
The question of a reaction by the Romanian state, in the case of Musk and his platform, X amplifying their ‘engagement’ with the political-electoral landscape of Romania in 2025 will certainly be further complicated by his high-level supporters in Bucharest.
“I want to see if there is a project that will put Romania on a train of change driven by Donald Trump and Elon Musk,” said Victor Ponta, who’s rapidly becoming a heavyweight in the PSD (Eds: ruling Social Democratic Party). Certainly, there are others in the political, economic and institutional spheres in our countrybbwho think like Ponta and could put obstruct the wheels designed to protect the electoral process, to the delight and benefit of Elon Musk.
Finally, if in 2024 there was only one striking problem, related to the potential of social media to derail Romania’s pro-Western path, 2025 promises to add X to the mix. It will probably also add Facebook, and Instagram, in light of updates to policy announced by Mark Zuckerberg: the elimination of fact-checking and the appointment of people close to Trump area to key positions of the Meta company.
It can’t be ruled out that Elon Musk sees Romania as an even more tempting testing ground than countries like Germany, Great Britain or France.
Because, as a fine connoisseur of any opportunity, it is possible that Musk considers – not unreasonably so – that Romania would be an infinitely easier prey for testing his cyber systems, for testing his ideas about the world, about restructuring the world order and destructuring of the rule of law.
Always thinking about the future and uncaring about the costs for other mortals, Elon Musk seems bent on fully asserting his personal power to reshape the world and secure an equally privileged place in the transformation of the world up to and beyond the horizon of Trump’s four years in office.
If Musk fails in the large countries that are theoretically more capable politically, economically and technologically to put up an effective resistance, but instead succeeds in giving a decisive impetus to the radical transformation of the weaker Romania, that will already be enough for him.
He will have demonstrated to the whole world that he can do it, and he will have learned valuable lessons about what he has to do to succeed in more developed countries in the future.
And that’s no small thing.
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