Germany getting bitten by the nationalist bug is cause for concern, and I shouldn’t have to spell out why. Over the last few years, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has been steadily gaining power and popularity, with Elon Musk counting himself as an enthusiastic supporter.
February’s federal elections saw them become Germany’s second-largest party, and it polling suggests they’re set to replicate that in upcoming local elections. But something is afoot. Their candidates are mysteriously dying off before election day, and paranoia is rising.
As reported by the BBC, up to six AfD candidates have suddenly died in the North Rhine-Westphalia region in recent weeks. Cops are eager to underline there’s no evidence of foul play in these deaths – some were natural causes and some causes of death are being kept private for family reasons – but party leaders are on edge, perhaps fearing that a mysterious vigilante is picking them off one by one.
NEW – AfD party has recorded six deaths among its politicians within a short period of time in the run-up to the upcoming local elections in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany — Welt pic.twitter.com/wNnJCuLRCX
— Disclose.tv (@disclosetv) September 1, 2025
AfD co-leader Alice Weidel reposted economist Stefan Homburg, who asserted that so many candidates dying in such a short amount of time is “statistically almost impossible”.Kay Gottschalk, AfD’s second-in-command in North Rhine-Westphalia, echoed that, acknowledging “suspicions” within the party, but said they didn’t want to get into “conspiracy theory territory”.
“This isn’t divine judgement” – L
They might not, but I and many others do! Speculation is rife that some kind of anonymous killer is at work, perhaps someone eager not to see Germany repeat the mistakes of the past. The apparently random deaths have also drawn comparisons to classic anime and manga Death Note, in which a magical notebook kills anyone whose name is written inside.
Nothing to see here apparently & the total of AfD deaths is now 6
— Lozzy Bpic.twitter.com/MpYf6dpGJQ
𝕏 (@TruthFairy131) September 2, 2025
So, is it time to summon the real-life L and solve this crime? Well, maybe hire a statistician first. It’s worth underlining that 20,000 candidates are running for office in this election, and their ages will skew towards the middle-aged and elderly.
Probability alone indicates some of them will die before polling day, but these six being in the same party may be a result of the “clustering illusion” that creates apparent patterns in random data. Importantly, we don’t know how many other candidates have died and which parties they belonged to.
To figure out if something really is going on in North Rhine-Westphalia, we’d need to conduct rigorous statistical testing to prove it’s significant and not just random chance. Even so, maybe the living candidates should watch their backs from now on, just to be sure.
