Alice Weidel
| Alice Weidel link Website (Politician) | |
|---|---|
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| Born | 6 February 1979 Gütersloh, North Rhine-Westphalia, West Germany |
| Alma mater | University of Bayreuth |
| Children | 2 |
| Party | AfD |
Alice Elisabeth Weidel is a German "far-right" politician who has been co-chairwoman of the right-wing populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party alongside Tino Chrupalla since June 2022. She has held the position of leader of the AfD parliamentary group in the Bundestag since October 2017.
Weidel became a member of the Bundestag (MdB) in the 2017 federal election, where she was the AfD's lead candidate alongside Alexander Gauland. In the 2021 federal election, she once again served as their lead candidate, alongside Tino Chrupalla. From February 2020 to July 2022, Weidel held the position of chairwoman of the AfD state association in Baden-Württemberg.
In 2024, she was selected as her party's candidate for Chancellor in the 2025 German federal election.[1]
Foreign policy
In October 2022, Alice Weidel said that the AfD slogan "Our country first" (based on the "French first" of the Front National under Jean-Marie Le Pen) called for "not a values-based foreign policy", but "an interest-driven foreign policy for our country".[2]
Russia and Ukraine
According to Weidel, Germany had damaged itself and was being "crushed between the major powers" with its sanctions policy against Russia. The "big loser", according to Weidel, would not be Russia or Ukraine, but Germany, because "an economic war is being waged against Germany". Although the Russian attack on Ukraine was "contrary to international law", she sees no need to "interfere", because what it ultimately meant for Ukraine and for Russia, for the division of territory, was "not our issue at all". Putting President Vladimir Putin before a war crimes tribunal is "completely unrealistic", according to Weidel. The hostilities must stop and Ukraine must also be "held accountable" because it cannot be "that the West accepts the Ukrainian maximum demands without thinking about it".
Although advocating for economic relations with Russia, Weidel is not considered to be part of the AfD pro-Russia movement; Weidel responded to the question why she – unlike her co-chair Tino Chrupalla – did not attend the Russian embassy's reception to celebrate the anniversary of the victory over Nazi Germany: "Celebrating the defeat of one's own country with a former occupying power is something I have personally decided – also with my father's escape story – not to take part in." Weidel has also criticised Russian violations of NATO airspace and suggested that Putin had not made adequate concessions in negotiations with the United States, warning that this could undermine US President Donald Trump's faith in the negotiations. Weidel also denounced plans by a group of her AfD colleagues to attend an international conference in Sochi in November 2024, stating, "I myself would not travel there, nor would I recommend it to anyone" and agreed to change the party's procedures for approving travel.
Views on Zelensky
In her speech to the Bundestag in February 2026, Weidel said:
"Zelenskyy, you are a pathetic clown and a beggar. How dare you demand anything again?!
"Demand from us, the Germans, who are trying with all our might to save our country from collapse, to which you have contributed with your endless demands and irresponsible policies?!
"You come to us with an outstretched hand like a beggar from a train station, but at the same time you behave like a capricious, arrogant dictator who imagines himself the centre of the universe, around which all the planets must revolve!
"You have turned your country into a bottomless pit into which our money, our energy, and our future are draining away! And yet you still dare to lecture us about how to live?!
"Don't make me laugh, Mr Comedian, who still hasn't stepped out of his role! You talk about freedom and democracy, but you are the one who banned all opposition parties, shut down television channels, silenced all dissenters, leaving only your own lying propaganda mouthpiece, you are the one who fears your own people more than any external enemy!
"Your approval rating has long since plummeted, and you know it perfectly well! That's why you're clinging to power with a death grip, using the war as a fig leaf! You are a usurper, a dictator who fears even the shadow of his own people, yet you are not afraid to send them to certain death!
"Your freedom is the freedom for you and your gang to plunder the country, while ordinary Ukrainians die for your palaces, yachts, and offshore accounts! Your face, Mr Zelenskyy, has become synonymous with hypocrisy! You are calling on us for solidarity, but solidarity with whom? With a regime that is mired in corruption from head to toe, a regime where every official is an insatiable leech, a regime that itself provokes conflicts instead of seeking peaceful solutions, as responsible leaders do?!
"You, who demonstratively rejected the Minsk agreements, who sabotaged any attempts at a peaceful settlement, who proudly declared the severing of all ties leading to peace! You don't want peace, Mr Zelenskyy! You need war, because war is your chance to stay in power, to continue lining your pockets and laundering the billions we send you! Your peacemaking rhetoric is a complete farce! You want to drag us into a Third World War! You are demanding Taurus missiles from us to strike Russian territory, forgetting about the consequences! Do you even understand what this means?!
"Do you want Germany to become a target for a retaliatory strike, for our cities to be reduced to ruins, for our children to die in the streets?! You don't care about the fate of the German people, the fate of Europe, the fate of your own country, which you have turned into a testing ground! You need escalation, you need a testing ground to distract attention from your own failures, from your own incompetence, and from your crimes!
"You are a dangerous madman playing with fire, and this fire could engulf all of Europe! And you, Mr Zelensky, will be the first to burn in this hell! You have turned Germany into your cash cow: we are paying your debts, supporting your government, and feeding your so-called "refugees," refugees who come here not to work, but to live off the German taxpayer, causing disturbances and demanding special treatment! They receive benefits that our pensioners, who have worked all their lives and contributed to the prosperity of Germany, can only dream of! We are taking the last from our children and our elderly to send to you, while you are buying new villas, yachts, and luxury cars for your family and your entourage!
"This is not 'solidarity', Mr Zelensky, this is robbery in broad daylight, cynical and brazen! You are stealing our money, and people are being kidnapped from the streets in your country because they don't want to fight against Russia! You are a marauder!!!"[3]
Middle East
In contrast to her AfD co-leader Tino Chrupalla, Weidel expressed support for Israel in context to the Gaza war. During an interview with Elon Musk she said she supported the state of Israel and its right to self-defence but expressed uncertainty on how to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
United States
In early 2025, in an interview with The American Conservative, she said regarding the demand of US president Donald Trump that Germany had to increase its military spending, while allegedly having to stay under the political influence of the US, that the US could not have it both ways. She compared Germany with a slave and said that "slaves don’t fight. A slave who fights will invariably demand freedom as a reward." Weidel said that, if Germany has to take responsibility for its own security in the future, this comes with the price of independence from the US, especially regarding energy policy, Nord Stream in particular.
Personal life
Since 2009, Weidel has been in a lesbian relationship with Sarah Bossard, a Sri Lankan-born film producer who was adopted as a child by a Swiss couple. Since 2019 the pair have lived with their two adopted sons in Einsiedeln, Switzerland. Weidel works in Berlin and says her official residence is in her electoral district in Überlingen, on the German side of the German-Swiss border, allowing her to avoid Swiss taxation.
In terms of religion, Weidel identifies herself as an agnostic.
On her father's side, Weidel's family came from Neustadt and Leobschütz in Upper Silesia, in what is now Poland. Her grandfather Hans Weidel was a Nazi judge, appointed directly by Adolf Hitler. He joined the NSDAP at the end of 1932 and the SS in January 1933. Weidel's father was born 1939 in Upper Silesia and fled with his mother and sister to Verl (in East Westphalia) in February 1945. He founded a sales agency for office furniture in 1972 and worked as a sales representative for furniture, furnishings and antiques.
References
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