'You just look dumb': Elon Musk compares Trudeau to Hitler, later deletes the tweet. Here's what he said

Triggering a storm on Twitter, Tesla CEO Elon Musk compared Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau with Adolf Hitler in a tweet that apparently expressed support for truckers protesting vaccine mandates.

The tweet was sent by Musk just before midnight on Wednesday in California and was deleted by noon on Thursday, with no explanation. Musk is yet to comment on the whole incident.

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Founder and CEO of Tesla Inc. Elon Musk tweeted support for Canadian truckers who had shut down roads and bridges in late January, drawing international attention to their opposition to Trudeau's health policies.

Musk responded to a tweet that described how Trudeau's government had ordered banks to cut funding to protesters by posting a meme of Adolf Hitler, with "Stop comparing me to Justin Trudeau" written over his head and "I had a budget" below it.

The tweet came as Tesla and Musk accused the Securities and Exchange Commission on Thursday of conducting an "endless" investigation as a punishment for Musk's criticism of the US government.

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74 million people follow Musk on Twitter, making him one of its most prominent users. For electric car maker Tesla, that's often seen as a marketing boon.

Many Twitter users considered Musk's comparison of Trudeau with Hitler, who led the Nazis to genocide millions of Jews and started World War Two, to be too extreme. Musk is known for his edgy humour and blunt assessment, but many users found his comparison of Trudeau with Hitler to be far-fetched.

"@elonmusk making a disgusting comparison of Trudeau to Hitler. Don’t do this kind of stuff. You just look dumb," wrote @ElliotMalin. At midday on Thursday, in place of the original tweet was the notice "This Tweet was deleted by the Tweet author."

Francois-Philippe Champagne, Canada's Minister of Industry, responded to Musk on Twitter, saying his reported comments were "quite frankly shocking".

In response to Musk's tweet, the American Jewish Committee called for an immediate apology.

However, before the deletion Musk's tweet was liked by more than 35,000 people, retweeted nearly 9,000 times, and received many positive responses.

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(With inputs from agencies)