The woman leading Germany’s far-right resurgence

Berlin: In a country that has earned a stereotype of being earnest, even dull and often boring, Alice Weidel doesn’t fit the typical modern image of a German political leader.

The 46-year-old head of Germany’s far-right political movement is openly gay, she’s in a relationship (with Sri Lankan filmmaker Sarah Bossard) and despite heading a party that prides itself on its patriotic stance, she is not even a full-time resident of Germany.

AfD leader Alice Weidel takes part in a televised discussion in Germany last Sunday.Credit: Getty Images

She officially splits her time between her home in central Switzerland and a house in her German voting district on Lake Constance, though she says that due to safety concerns, she rarely stays at the German address.

The candidate for chancellor for the Alternative for Germany, known as the AfD, has emerged as a formidable figure in German politics. With a post on his social media platform X, Elon Musk said recently: “Only the AfD can save Germany,” igniting a firestorm of debate as the nation prepares for its federal election on Sunday.

Voters are expected to oust Olaf Scholz, the unpopular Social Democrat chancellor who succeeded Angela Merkel after her long reign. After just three years in office, Scholz is widely anticipated to become Germany’s first one-term leader since the 1960s.

His tenure, in coalition with the Greens and libertarian Free Democratic Party, has been dominated by the invasion of Ukraine, which severed Germany’s umbilical cord to Russian gas fields. His “traffic light” administration (referring to the traditional colours of the parties: red, yellow and green) has taken much of the flak for the surge in energy prices and the general lament about the state of German industry.

Manufacturers are shuttering plants, cutting jobs by the tens of thousands, and upping sticks to cheaper or more dynamic countries such as China and the US. Even Germany’s railways, once a source of national pride, have become something of an embarrassment in a country with a reputation for efficiency and engineering prowess.

It has all probably cleared the path for Friedrich Merz, Merkel’s longtime rival for control of the Christian Democratic Union for much of this century, to finally take the top job.

Famously pushed aside by Merkel, the 69-year-old is now back and is promising a break from the predecessor’s centrist approach.

Merkel’s undoubted legacy has become her 2015 decision to welcome over a million migrants, mostly from Syria, under the slogan “wir schaffen das” – “we can do it”. Amid recent terrorist attacks and rising unemployment, public sentiment has soured towards immigrants and tensions have been steadily increasing.

Voters are in a dark mood in Germany.Credit: AP

The pair recently clashed publicly over immigration and Merz’s decision to push a parliamentary motion on tighter immigration control with the help of the far right, breaking Germany’s so-called firewall.

But the populist AfD, still seen as extreme by many Germans, is set to secure a record 20 per cent of the vote, fuelled by widespread frustration over the country’s economic downturn, its immigration policies and crime rates.

At the crossroads?

The upcoming poll is significant not only because it marks a shift to the right in Europe’s largest economy, just a few years after it veered left in 2021, but also because it has revealed a deep, unprecedented loss of national confidence in Germany’s future.

According to a YouGov poll conducted for the German Press Agency this week, the AfD, polling at 21 per cent nationwide, could significantly increase its share of the vote in the upcoming election, potentially delivering its best national performance in 12 years.

It is polling well ahead of the centre-left Social Democrats (16 per cent) of the incumbent chancellor, Scholz, and behind the conservative Christian Democrats (29 per cent). But those parties say they would never partner with Weidel’s party to form a government.

“The AfD’s rise has shocked many Germans,” said Constanze Stelzenmuller, an expert on German foreign and security policy and strategy who is a senior fellow in the Centre on the United States and Europe at the Brookings Institution.

Olaf Scholz looks likely to become Germany’s first one-term chancellor since the 1960s.. Credit: AP

“It is one of Europe’s most openly far-right and pro-Kremlin parties; in the European Parliament, it caucuses on the extreme right of the political spectrum in the Europe of Sovereign Nations group.”

A key factor behind the AfD’s growing influence is the expansion of its support base. Recent polling data reveals the party is gaining traction among blue-collar workers and even some migrant communities in Germany’s economically struggling industrial areas, regions that were previously strongholds of left-wing politics.

Among the various nationalist and anti-establishment parties on the rise across Europe, the AfD stands out for its radical agenda. It advocates Germany’s exit from the EU, the lifting of sanctions on Russia and ending support for Ukraine. It has criticised the country’s culture of Holocaust remembrance. Some of its regional chapters are classified as far-right extremist groups by Germany’s domestic intelligence agency.

Its ascension has drawn particular attention in Germany because of the country’s post-Weimar constitution, which was designed to prevent the instability and extremism that led to Adolf Hitler’s rise to power. The fact that AfD lawmakers and members of the centre-right CDU recently voted together for a symbolic anti-immigration motion sparked protests, drawing hundreds of thousands of people into the streets.

Smiling leading members of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), including AfD chancellor candidate Alice Weidel, shoot a selfie at the Bundestag.Credit: Getty Images

Weidel: soft or not?

While Weidel’s personal story suggests a softening of the party line, her language does not. She has promised to tear down wind turbines and to dismiss gender studies professors. She has spoken about “remigration”, a term used by the far right that is widely interpreted as code for deportations.

“Make it absolutely clear to the whole world: German borders are closed,” she told a cheering crowd when the AfD officially nominated her as its candidate last month.

She has strongly supported the party’s increasing emphasis on migration and German nationalism, once referring to immigrants as “burqas, girls in headscarves, knife-wielding men on government benefits, and other good-for-nothing people”. This comment sparked outrage among centrist rivals but it also earned her admiration from those who view immigration as a national threat.

Weidel has only ever offered lukewarm condemnation of her party’s most extreme members, some of whom have minimised the Holocaust and Germany’s Nazi past. One of the party’s past campaign advertisements provoked outrage when it featured two blonde parents raising their arms to create a symbolic roof over their two blonde children.

Conservative newspaper Die Welt has reported her own grandfather was a Nazi party member who was named a military judge in occupied Warsaw. She said she did not know her grandfather, who died when she was six, and that the Nazi past was never a topic of discussion in her family.

Yet much of the party’s public support has come from its attack on net zero climate policies of the mainstream parties, the phasing out of coal-fired and nuclear power and the struggles of the domestic car industry.

Its posters throughout the streets of Dresden, Nuremberg, Munich and right across the country talk about “ending the Green experiment”.

Council on Foreign Relations senior policy fellow Jeremy Cliffe says the party deserves little credit for this momentum.

Frankfurt prepares for the federal election.Credit: AP

“It is extreme even by the standards of the European far-right and lacks the quasi-professionalisation of counterparts like Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy,” he says, and Weidel has been a “weak and uncharismatic presence”, he says.

“The AfD’s strength is largely circumstantial. In part, it reflects the unpopularity of the traffic-light coalition parties.”

Vibe turnaround required

Despite the AfD’s growing popularity, it is unlikely to join any coalition government, as all other parties have ruled out co-operation with it. This could lead to longer coalition negotiations after the election, especially if the AfD secures a significant number of seats on Sunday.

Hertie School economics professor Christian Traxler says after two years of economic stagnation, the mood in the population appears to be much worse than the actual situation. Growth forecasts for 2025 for a rise of about 0.3 per cent of GDP, after two years of mild recession.

“Many surveys document that people judge their own personal economic wellbeing rather positively,” he says. “At the same time, the general economic situation in the country is perceived as very negative.”

He says this sentiment has a tailwind for conservative parties, which have promised economic recovery. But he says this will be difficult in a world shaped by international conflicts and trade wars.

“The main task for the next government will be to manage a turnaround in vibes: for the German economy to grow again, we need optimistic consumers who are more willing to spend their money,” he says.

As for the wider stakes? Musk told a crowd of AfD supporters recently that the election “could decide the entire fate of Europe”.

It goes to show that even the US supporters of European far-right movements, much like the Kremlin, still see Germany as the key to the continent’s democratic political order.

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