Businessman named Hitler Mussolini elected mayor in Peru

Businessman Hitler Mussolini Simeon Flores, who shares two of his names with infamous European dictators, has won the mayoral race in a remote Andean district of Peru, according to local election data. Flores, 45, was elected mayor of Queropalca, a municipality in the central Huanuco region. He will assume office on January 1.

Representing the left-wing Ahora Nacion party, he secured 229 of the 663 votes cast in the October 4 elections, the National Office of Electoral Processes reported. His nearest challenger, far-right candidate Gaspar Osorio, received 204 votes.

Flores works in freight transportation. Electoral authorities said he was a member of Popular Force, the party of right-wing President Keiko Fujimori, until 2025. Although the name is linked to Adolf Hitler, the Nazi dictator of Germany during World War II, Flores is not the first person with that name to win office in Peru. In 2021, physician Hitler Saavedra Casternoque was elected to parliament on the ticket of the centrist Somos Peru party.

In 2018, Hitler Alba Sanchez won the mayoralty of Yungar, another district in the Andes. During his campaign, he described himself as "the good Hitler."