Alternative for Germany | AfD: More "centre", less danger of ban

The AfD has once again made a lot of headlines in recent days. There was talk of a "policy paper" in which the AfD turned away from "remigration" and "leading culture." Well, what the AfD parliamentary group has decided on is not a policy paper, but merely a strategy paper for the group. The fact that terms like "remigration" are missing from it can be interpreted as moderation on the part of the party , but it doesn't have to be. The way the AfD wants to solve problems remains racist. To combat the housing shortage, for example, the party proposes deportations. Martin Sellner, the most prominent proponent of the term "remigration" in German-speaking countries, argues the same thing.

There are likely two reasons why terms like "remigration" do not appear in the parliamentary group's strategy paper. The first is easily explained: The AfD wants to prevent its classification by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution as a "confirmed right-wing extremist effort" from standing up in court. It wants to avoid being considered an anti-constitutional party and major debates about banning it. Therefore, it considers it expedient to avoid terms like "remigration." This is especially true since the Federal Administrative Court recently clearly stated in the trial over the ban of the magazine "Compact" that it considers Sellner's "remigration concept" to be unconstitutional.

The second reason is likely more strategic. "Remigration" is clearly a term of the extreme right. However, the AfD has a de facto sole parliamentary representation there anyway. It is more important for the party to win voters from the so-called center. This is clearly evident from a presentation shown at the parliamentary group's retreat and published by the website Politico.

The presentation presents numerous data on the AfD electorate, including age, migration background, educational qualifications, perceived competence, and voter migration. The parliamentary group draws conclusions about its strengths and weaknesses from this. The party sees weaknesses among women, the over-60s generation, academics, residents of large cities, Germans with a migration background, and religiously affiliated Christians. The parliamentary group intends to moderate its tone for these groups.

Strategically, the parliamentary group is focusing on the obvious. It aims to use issues related to the "culture war" such as gender and "multiculturalism/nation" to widen the gap between the CDU on the one hand and the SPD, the Greens, and The Left on the other. This is intended to drive the CDU into a corner. Either it abandons the "firewall" or the AfD can portray it as increasingly less credible. To this end, the parliamentary group wants to position itself more strongly on economic and fiscal policy issues and present itself as an alternative to the CDU/CSU. The parliamentary group's stated goal is the chancellorship of Alice Weidel.

The AfD's federal executive board also discussed the party's external image on Monday. Roman Reusch, the executive board member responsible for legal proceedings with the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, recommended that the party refrain from collaborating with and holding events with Martin Sellner. As the "Welt" newspaper first reported, Reusch primarily argued that Sellner had been mentioned in the "Compact" trial. There was no formal resolution to no longer hold events with the Austrian identitarian; the recommendation is to be discussed at a meeting with the state chairmen in two weeks.

One of the state chairmen, Björn Höcke from Thuringia, responded to Sellner's distancing himself on social media. He posted a picture of himself with Sellner's book "Remigration" and offered a positive reading recommendation. A key point in the book was that Sellner should not be "stabbed in the back," even for tactical reasons. Anyone who distances themselves will lose. Thus, Höcke is once again in line with the new right party milieu , which, due to the strategy debate, is already warning of a "Merkelization" of the AfD. Representatives of this wing warn that a watered-down AfD capable of forming a coalition could quickly collapse again. This is what happened to many right-wing parties in Europe that assumed government responsibility too quickly.