This paper examines strategic candidate voting against radical-right parties, focusing on the Alternative for Germany (AfD) in Germany’s 2025 federal election. Germany has long been considered “hard ground” for radical-right parties, yet the AfD has expanded rapidly over the past decade and, in 2025, fielded numerous highly competi­tive district candi­dates, raising concerns about poten­tial AfD direct mandates. Against this back­drop, we inves­tigate whether main­stream voters coordi­nated their candi­date choices to prevent these candi­dates from winning. In a first study, we analyze district-level election results to assess how the strength of AfD candi­dates shapes patterns of candidate-vote compe­tition. Stronger AfD conten­ders are associated with a lower number of effective candi­dates and with notable over­perfor­mance of the leading non-AfD candidate, especially in closely contested districts. In a second study, we combine district results with survey data from the German Longi­tudinal Election Study and estimate multilevel models to test whether voters cross partisan lines under compe­titive threat. The analysis confirms that voters are willing to support the most viable non-AfD candi­date in districts where the AfD is particularly strong, thus providing direct evidence of strategic candidate voting at the indivi­dual level. Overall, our findings show how variation in the local strength of AfD candi­dates shapes strategic coordi­nation among voters, with more compe­titive districts generating stronger support for the leading non-AfD alternative.

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Hillen, Sven, and Jessica Kuhlmann (2026): “Blocking the Radical Right: Evidence from Strategic Candidate Voting Against the AfD in Germany’s 2025 Federal Election”, in: Politische Vierteljahresschrift. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11615-026-00648-8.