Armin Laschet attends reading of '00-Laschet' spy comedy and reads a chapter himself
Former chancellor candidate Armin Laschet attended a reading of David Safier's new crime comedy '00-Laschet' in Aachen, where he is portrayed as a bumbling spy. Laschet even took the stage to read a chapter himself.
The event
Bestselling author David Safier presented his new crime comedy "00-Laschet" at the Forum of the Aachener Zeitung on 16 July 2026. The reading drew an unusual guest: Armin Laschet himself, the CDU politician and former chancellor candidate who is the book's protagonist. Safier opened the evening with a joke that set the tone.
We have a star guest today that you all surely know. Welcome: Boris Pistorius!
The quip referenced the long-running observation that Laschet and Defense Minister Boris Pistorius share a striking resemblance. Laschet, dressed in a summer sand-colored suit, took it in stride.
The book
"00-Laschet" reimagines the politician as a reluctant, somewhat clumsy spy. After his failed bid for the chancellorship, the fictional Laschet becomes Federal President, only to be drawn into secret service work from a base hidden beneath Bellevue Palace. Safier's portrayal is warm-hearted but far from suave: the book cover shows the agent holding a hairdryer instead of a pistol, and an early scene has him smearing himself with jam. The slogan "License to Laugh" is printed on the cover, an unavoidable echo of Laschet's ill-timed laughter during the 2021 flood disaster, widely seen as a factor in his electoral defeat.
Laschet's reaction
Laschet did not merely sit in the audience. He climbed onto the stage and read a chapter himself, one he described as among the "more serious" passages, in which a super-rich tech entrepreneur rhapsodizes about artificial superintelligence and trips to Mars. Speaking to the German Press Agency, he acknowledged the oddity of the situation.
You have to have a bit of humor. When I first heard about it, I thought it was a joke. But it is a real book.
He added that he found the book "quite successful."
A career of contrasts
The appearance fits a peculiar phase in Laschet's career. He remains chairman of the Bundestag's Foreign Affairs Committee and had just returned from the Belarus-Poland border before the reading. At the same time, he has become a fixture of internet culture: a Pistorius doppelgänger, a subject of e-scooter photos, and now the star of a spy parody. Safier previously turned Angela Merkel into a hobby detective in his "Miss Merkel" series, but Merkel never attended a reading. Laschet's willingness to join the joke marks a departure, blending political gravity with self-deprecating showmanship.
