Hubert Aiwanger, Bavaria's deputy state premier, economy minister, and chairman of the right-wing populist Free Voters party, was found dead Wednesday evening at the Neuer Fritz Hotel on Friedrichstrasse in central Berlin. He was 55. Berlin's public prosecutor's office has launched an investigation to determine the cause of death and rule out foul play. The circumstances remain unclear. Aiwanger had been in Berlin for the opening of his party's new office in the capital, a move that signaled the Free Voters' ongoing ambition to become a serious player in federal politics. He canceled his scheduled speech due to feeling unwell, according to German news agency dpa and tabloid Bild. His body was discovered that evening. Bavarian state premier Markus Söder of the CSU called the death "an absolute tragedy" and said his thoughts were with Aiwanger's family and two children. Aiwanger lived with Tanja Schweiger, a district administrator for the Free Voters, and was not married. Aiwanger was the Free Voters' most recognizable figure nationally — combative, populist, and polarizing. Born in Lower Bavaria, he entered the Bavarian State Parliament in 2008 and became parliamentary group leader. When the Free Voters formed a coalition with Söder's CSU in 2018, Aiwanger became the coalition's indispensable junior partner, holding the economy portfolio and the deputy premiership. His political brand was built on rural Bavaria's economic anxieties and a willingness to pick fights that mainstream conservatives avoided. But that brand carried liabilities. In the weeks before the 2023 Bavarian state elections, the Süddeutsche Zeitung reported that Aiwanger had written an antisemitic leaflet during high school in the 1980s, one that included references to Nazi-era atrocities including Auschwitz. He survived the scandal politically but never shed it entirely. Despite his dominance in Bavaria, Aiwanger could not translate state-level success into federal power. The Free Voters never cleared the threshold to enter the Bundestag. The Berlin office he was set to inaugurate represented one more attempt to change that equation — an attempt now orphaned. His death leaves a structural hole in Bavarian coalition politics. The Free Voters are a one-leader party in a way that the CSU is not. Without Aiwanger, the party's identity, coalition leverage, and federal ambitions are all in question. Bavaria's governing coalition is intact on paper but has lost the personality that held the junior partner together.
