Errol Musk, the father of tech billionaire and Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) head Elon Musk, suggested that his son isn’t racist because of his past relationships with “Black servants” who worked for their family while he was growing up in apartheid South Africa.
According to the Washington Post, Erroll made the comment amid inquiries into Elon’s stance on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) as the Trump administration aims to eliminate such policies and initiatives.
Erroll recalled that his two sons weren’t interested in politics while growing up.
“They were not into political nonsense, and we lived in a very well-run, law-abiding country with virtually no crime at all,” Errol said of Elon’s childhood in South Africa. “Actually no crime. We had several black servants who were their friends.”
The Musks lived in South Africa while it was run by a racial segregationist regime that kept its majority-Black population in population and servitude until 1994.
Rudolph Pienaar, a biomedical scientist who graduated with Elon from Pretoria Boys High School in 1988, also commented on the tech billionaire’s upbringing, saying that his privilege made it difficult to grasp the concept of systemic racial oppression.
“We grew up in a bubble of entitlement,” Pienaar told the Post. “I am not sure if Elon can conceive of systematic discrimination and struggle because that’s not his experience. His life now in some ways is how it was under apartheid — rich and entitled with the entire society built to sustain him and his ilk.”
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