By MUNICH — She has two children with a Sri Lankan-born woman, speaks Chinese and previously worked at global financial institutions — an unconventional profile for the leader of a male-dominated far-right party that venerates traditional family values, fosters deep anti-immigrant sentiments and promotes populist economic policies.
But in recent elections, Alice Weidel took the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party from the fringes to the heart of power. Championed by Elon Musk and Vice President JD Vance, Weidel is part of a growing group of powerful women leading Europe’s ascendant far-right parties, alongside Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and French presidential hopeful Marine Le Pen.
With party co-chair Tino Chrupalla, Weidel led the AfD to second place in Germany’s election last month, a triumph for a party being monitored by the country’s domestic intelligence agency for suspected extremism.
“Nobody has done this in Europe in such a short time,” a beaming Weidel said at a news conference after her party secured just over 20% of the vote, doubling its share from 2021. Noting that she had missed several calls from Musk that morning, she added that her party “especially want a very good, a very good relationship with the Trump administration, who are doing an excellent job.”
Weidel, who has previously praised the importance of children being raised in a traditional, nuclear family and has said that legalizing same-sex marriage is unimportant, nonetheless raises her two sons with her Sri Lankan-born female partner of 20 years, Sarah Bossard, in Willerzell, a sleepy village in the heart of Switzerland with around 1,000 residents. (Officially, she is registered as a resident of Überlingen, in Germany, just over the border from Switzerland.)
The AfD has opposed gay marriage and the expansion of laws allowing same-sex couples to adopt, but Weidel has said her sexuality does not conflict with the AfD’s traditional values, and analysts say the party’s rank and file are prepared to overlook her family life as long as she brings them success.
Before entering politics, Weidel was a consultant for Goldman Sachs and Allianz Global Investors, a slice of her background that appeals to those in the AfD who seek to appear both more moderate than its most anti-immigrant flank and more practical, though she has championed the AfD’s populist economic platform of big tax cuts and steep increases in public spending.
