After four years ago becoming the first openly anti-immigrant party to enter the German parliament, the AfD now becomes the first party to be monitored in this way since the end of the Nazi era in 1945.
He was taken to the Bundestag in 2017 by voters irritated by Chancellor Angela Merkel’s decision to receive more than one million migrants. But he was ostracized by other parties, who say his rhetoric contributes to an atmosphere of hatred that encourages violence against immigrants.
The BfV move follows a two-year review of the AfD’s political platform and will allow the agency to listen to calls and conversations involving members of the AfD and analyze party funding.
A BfV spokeswoman declined to comment, citing a court case filed by AfD, but the party was furious.
“The agenda is clear. First we are made a ‘case to investigate’, now we are a ‘suspect case’ and we are under surveillance – and at some point there will be a request to ban our party,” said Alexander Gauland, AfD’s parliamentary leader. . “This, thank God, will be a decision of the Constitutional Court and not of the BfV.”
Gauland and AfD co-leader Tino Chrupalla said at a news conference that they only heard about the decision, first reported by Der Spiegel magazine, through media reports. They accused the BfV of trying to undermine their chances in the September national elections.
Court challenge
The Central Council of Jews in Germany welcomed the decision, saying: “AfD’s destructive policies undermine our democratic institutions and discredit democracy among citizens.”
The AfD registered 12.6% support in the 2017 federal elections to become the third largest party in the Bundestag, and also has legislators in all 16 regional assemblies.
But its support has dropped to about 9% in recent polls, hampered by internal strife and its opposition to blockade measures to contain the coronavirus pandemic.
One of its co-leaders, Joerg Meuthen, opened a loophole by arguing that the AfD needs to expel members suspected of sympathizing with far-right groups that advocate violence in order to broaden its appeal.
The AfD also obtained a court decision that publicly prevented the BfV from calling it a “case under investigation”, as this puts him at a disadvantage in the elections. An attempt to prevent the revision of the BfV is still in the courts, however.
The BfV told the Cologne Administrative Court last month that it would not monitor AfD lawmakers in national, regional or European parliaments while the case was being heard.
This suggested that formal surveillance would, for the time being, be limited to members of the lower level party.
Four years ago, the German government failed to ban the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party (NPD), which won a handful of seats in several regional state assemblies. The Constitutional Court ruled that, although it looked like Adolf Hitler’s Nazi party, it was too weak to put democracy at risk.