Alice Weidel.
The world’s richest businessman, Elon Musk — who is also an advisor to President Donald Trump — conducted a 75-minute virtual interview on his X platform on January 9 with Alice Weidel, the 45-year-old co-leader of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), according to German authorities. Notably, the interview took place on the eve of the party’s congress (January 11–12), where she was nominated as the party’s candidate for chancellor for the first time in AfD history. She will lead the «Alternative» in the election campaign, which ends on February 23.
Musk, by the way, called her the «leading candidate» to head the Berlin cabinet. He also insisted that «only the AfD can save Germany». And that carries weight — at least in terms of poll ratings. He knows a thing or two about this: his social network was a notable factor in Trump’s victory.
The conversation with Alice was all-encompassing: from energy policy and education to their shared desire to reduce German bureaucracy and curb illegal immigration. They seemed to have discovered kindred spirits. In particular, both agreed on the need to end the fighting in Ukraine. Musk asserted, «President Trump will resolve this conflict very quickly». The British Guardian commented on the course of the discussion as follows: «They touched on Douglas Adams (the English writer), Schopenhauer (the German philosopher), the meaning of life, whether Adolf Hitler was a socialist or a far-right extremist, and how to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict». They even touched on the subject of a «manned expedition to Mars». When Weidel asked «when?», Musk replied that he plans to send unmanned spacecraft in about two years, and manned missions in about four years.
In short, Musk promoted himself (after all, according to Adams, «the question is more important than the answer») and presented Alice in the best possible light — showing her as a multifaceted individual and politician.
Along the way, he called German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier a «tyrant» for criticizing the AfD and declared that Chancellor Olaf Scholz should have resigned after the terrorist attack at the Christmas market in Magdeburg.
In retaliation, Scholz accused Musk of publicly supporting far-right extremists in many places: Britain, Germany, and several other countries.
«This is completely unacceptable, because it hinders the democratic development of Europe and threatens our unity», he noted.
The Weidel interview caused a storm not only among German politicians — who accused Elon of interfering in the election — but also among the liberal European establishment. In both Berlin and Brussels, officials are scrambling to find legal means to rein him in.
Meanwhile, after receiving such support, Alice is apparently blossoming. The AfD’s national ratings are on the rise and now stand at 22% (up from 19.5% four weeks ago), second only to the conservative CDU/CSU bloc at 31%.
Public interest in Weidel herself has also been rekindled. She has not gone unnoticed in the largely male AfD leadership. There are only nine women in the parliamentary group she leads. The other 69 members of parliament are men — so the proportion of women in the parliamentary group is only 11.5%. By comparison, the CDU/CSU has 25.4 percent women, and the Greens have 59.3 percent.
Where does Alice’s «masculine» character come from? She lives in a same-sex marriage with a Sri Lankan woman and raises two adopted children. Such a lifestyle is far from the AfD’s official platform of traditional family values. But that doesn’t bother Weidel.
Her idol is the «Iron Lady», Margaret Thatcher.
«I admire her life story, her willingness to swim against the tide — even when it’s uncomfortable», she admitted in an interview with Bild.
Weidel can rightly be called a political heavyweight. She has been a member of the AfD since 2013. She also headed the party’s list in the last federal election, and back then the Alternative managed to get 10.3 percent of the vote. Now, the party’s support has more than doubled.
Alice freely admits that she likes to make provocative statements. For example, she once called all refugees and asylum seekers «knife-wielding welfare recipients» and referred to underage Muslim girls as «headscarf girls». She received an official public reprimand in parliament.
«Toughening up the rhetoric is a stylistic way of intensifying the debate», she later said in an interview.
She has received several threats of physical violence. Once (after a warning from counterintelligence) she even had to leave the country with her family for a while.
As for Musk, he may see his German favourite as «Trump in a skirt». But she will definitely not become chancellor this time (after the February 23 elections). Even if the AfD were to make a final surge and overtake the conservatives (which is hard to imagine), she would not be allowed to take power. Alice is in a similar situation to the French far-right politician Marine Le Pen, leader of the National Front. Whenever the National Front reaches the second round of the presidential election and comes close to winning, all the other parties unite against her, forming what is known as the «democratic barrier». The goal is to keep her out of power.
Currently, the same principle is at work in Germany: no other parliamentary party is willing to form a coalition with the AfD. That’s the way it is now, but things could change in the foreseeable future. And Alice is only 45. So it’s no coincidence that Musk (read: Trump) took notice of her.