Bavaria's Minister President Markus Söder (59, CSU) cultivates a clear image on Instagram: burgers, döner kebab, pork knuckle. His daughter Gloria-Sophie Burkandt (27) has now put this staging into perspective. "My father eats salad too", the model told the "Neue Osnabrücker Zeitung". "Just last week I watched him do it. There was meat with it, but he ate the salad happily."
Otherwise too, the CSU leader is less one-sided when it comes to food than the pictures suggest. "He also likes fruit and vegetables, even if he likes to present it as if he eats nothing but meat", Burkandt told the newspaper. "He's not that bad at all."
Veganism was not a contentious issue at home
This is also interesting because Burkandt herself lived vegan for years. She emphasized that it never became a conflict in the family. She categorizes Söder's jabs at meatless diets in the same category as the photos of his meals. "He enjoys teasing vegans, but that's public relations", the 27-year-old said. "Privately, he completely accepted it. Basically his motto is: live and let live."
Gloria-Sophie Burkandt, who has completed a business degree and is known as an influencer and model, is the eldest daughter of Markus Söder and comes from an earlier relationship of the Bavarian Minister President. "I want to move people, inspire them, make a difference in social and political terms. And perhaps I wouldn't think so big if I didn't have my father as a role model", she explained at the beginning of the year in an interview with "Madonna". She is not currently pursuing a real political career. "As long as my father is politically active, that's out of the question for me. Who knows what will happen in ten or twenty years."
Reports about Eric Schmidt burden her
Burkandt also reveals to the newspaper what form of attention currently burdens her most: the reporting about her relationship with former Google CEO Eric Schmidt (71). She can already sense in advance when a wave is rolling toward her: "I always notice it the day before such a media explosion, intuitively. I'm super restless, I can't sleep and then I wake up the next day and immediately get all the messages. That totally stresses me out. I have to learn how to deal with it."
She judges the logic behind it soberly. "There's no such thing as bad press anymore. The main thing is that you get mentioned. It doesn't matter whether the news is good or bad", Burkandt said. She finds the imbalance in topics annoying: "And that's a shame: There's no headline for my social projects. There are only headlines for my love life or when a quiz show didn't go so well."
Inquiries from around the world
According to Burkandt, after the speculation about Schmidt, media outlets from far beyond Germany contacted her. "When such news is out, suddenly lots of press inquiries come in, this time from all the international press. You simply don't respond to them at all." However, she is not entirely happy with this strategy: "But there are also moments when I think: I would like to explain my side."
What connects her to the former Google CEO, Burkandt also left open in the interview. She can currently be seen in the ProSieben series "Born Famous - Fluch oder Segen", which deals with the children of prominent parents. For the format, father and daughter stood together in front of the camera and gave insights into their relationship.
