Like it or not, the far right is heading for Germany’s Bundestag | Alan Posener Read moreOverall, and like other populist parties around Europe, AfD vastly outperforms traditional parties on social media. Satirical group Die Partei however, led this year by Istanbul-born standup comedian Serdar Somuncu, has grown faster online than any other party, gathering 31,608 new fans compared with the AfD’s 29,302. Stefan Niggemeier, a journalist, has argued that any vote for Die Partei, which entered the European parliament in 2014, was a vote wasted from stopping the AfD’s march into the Bundestag. However, the extent to which social media will have an impact on Sunday’s vote in Germany remains subject to debate. According to its press office, the AfD had 29,000 paying members at the start of September, while Die Partei has about 25,000.

Source: The Guardian September 21, 2017 03:56 UTC