AfD supports migrant repatriation as elections approach

The German far right is in good spirits.

On Saturday, as its conference took place in the eastern town of Riesa in Saxony, Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) laid out its ambitions to close Germany’s borders, resume purchasing Russian gas and, in effect, dismantle the EU.

German media reported that the party’s agreed manifesto includes plans to abandon the Paris climate agreement, abandon the euro and create a new confederation of states.

AfD leader Alice Weidel even publicly embraced the term “remigration,” a word widely understood to mean the “return” or mass deportation of people of migrant origin.

Thousands of anti-AfD protesters invaded the streets of Riesa on Saturday, attempting to block access to the conference venue.

When Alice Weidel finally took the stage, she described the activists outside as a “left-wing mob.”

And, before a conference room full of excited delegates, he spoke of “large-scale repatriations.”

“And I have to be honest with you: if it’s going to be called remigration, then that’s what it will be: remigration,” she said.

It’s a striking change from just a year ago, when he sought to distance himself from a scandal centered on this highly controversial concept.

There were anti-AfD demonstrations across the country after it emerged that senior party figures had been among those attending a meeting where “remigration” was allegedly discussed with Martin Sellner, an Austrian far-right activist who has a neo-Nazi past. .

Sellner has written about “remigrant” asylum seekers, some foreigners with residency rights, and “unassimilated” citizens.

A buzzword on Europe’s far right is that some claim that legal residents would not be forced to leave. Critics say “remigration” is simply a euphemism for an openly racist mass deportation plan.

But Alice Weidel’s decision to personally coin the term, weeks before an early federal election, demonstrates her party’s growing radicalism and confidence.

He also promised to demolish wind farms he called “shame mills”, abandon the EU asylum system and “expel” gender studies professors.

The AfD consistently ranks second in polls in Germany and made gains in recent regional elections in the east of the country, where the party is strongest.

However, it is highly unlikely that he will come to power because other parties will not work with the AfD.

Some sectors of the AfD have been classified by national intelligence services as far-right.

In 2024, a far-right AfD talisman, Björn Höcke, was fined twice for using a banned Nazi SA paramilitary phrase, “Alles für Deutschland” (“all for Germany”).

He called it an “everyday phrase” and denied having knowledge of its origins, despite having been a history teacher.

Reports that members of the conference in Riesa this weekend chanted “Alice für Deutschland” sparked quick comparisons in the German media.

However, AfD figures have frequently complained that they are demonized and persecuted by a biased media and establishment.

And Alice Weidel’s party – of which she is co-leader and now a candidate for chancellor – has weathered repeated storms to hover around or even exceed 20% in national polls.

The 45-year-old economist, who previously worked for Goldman Sachs and is in a same-sex relationship, has tried to smooth over the rough edges of her party.

But for those staunchly opposed to the AfD, she is a fig leaf or, as one Social Democrat put it, a “wolf in sheep’s clothing.”

Anyway, she is enjoying a new spotlight after being invited by tech billionaire, Elon Musk, for a live talk on his X platform last weekwhere he unconditionally supported the party.

His statement during this discussion that Adolf Hitler was, in fact, a communist sparked condemnation, given the Nazi leader’s known anti-communism.

Critics warned of Nazi revisionism, something the AfD has been accused of in the past.

Björn Höcke once called for a “180-degree turn” in the way Germany handles its Nazi past, while a former co-leader, Alexander Gauland, described the Nazi era as “just a speck of shit in more than 1,000 years of successful history of Germany”. “.

However, the AfD’s anti-establishment, anti-immigration and anti-woke agenda is finding supporters in Germany who will go to the polls on February 23.