For years, the question of whether the Alternative for Germany (AfD) could be banned has hovered at the edges of German politics, with left-wing parties and even some within the Christian Democrats (CDU) calling for the party’s ban — even if the AfD is the most popular party in the country.
A sweeping new legal report from a left-wing NGO has now thrust that question back to the center, concluding not only that the party is unconstitutional, but that the country’s top court would likely agree.
The 1,500-page analysis was produced by the NGO Society for Civil Rights, or the Gesellschaft für Freiheitsrechte (GFF) in German, and unveiled in Berlin on Thursday. Compiled over 13 months by an eight-member team of experts — it argues that the AfD violates both the principle of democracy and the concept of human dignity enshrined in Germany’s constitution. The authors did not formally demand a ban, but leave little doubt about where their findings point.
Instead, the report is supposed to serve as the ammunition for a ban.
“The legal report reaches the unequivocal conclusion that the AfD is unconstitutional,” said the GFF’s Bijan Moini, who led the project. An application to outlaw the party would, “in our assessment, likely succeed.”
At the heart of the report is the claim that the AfD, through both its stated aims and the conduct of its supporters, seeks to “undermine the free democratic basic order.” Its political agenda, the summary states, is directed at the “exclusion, vilification, and extensive legal marginalization” of foreigners, Germans with a migration background, Muslims, and other groups.
The report comes at a time when the AfD is flirting with 30 percent in the polls and has increasingly distanced itself from the second-place Christian Democrats (CDU), which is now nine points behind the AfD. As a result, opponents of the AfD are increasingly worried they will be unable to defeat the party through democratic means. Even if the AfD is unable to form a majority, if it secures a large enough voter share, it could make state and even the federal government ungovernable for the establishment and left-wing parties.
Another alarming element for the left is the fact that more and more voters are supportive of the CDU and other parties cooperating with the AfD.
One of the report’s central contentions is that the AfD has lost any internal force capable of restraining its so-called most extreme elements.
“An internal party faction that publicly and consistently opposes the radical forces within the AfD no longer exists,” it claims.
Notably, the GFF NGO is funded in part by The European AI & Society Fund and The Digital Freedom Fund (DFF), which are in turn funded by organizations like the Ford Foundation and the Open Society Foundations, which is in turn funded by billionaire George Soros. However, the GFF stated that this specific report was entirely funded through private donations.
The GFF argues that while some figures within the party have been expelled, the AfD has yet to expel members the NGO claims are the most problematic, including party leader Alice Weidel, MEP Maximilian Krah, and Saxony-Anhalt’s Hans-Thomas Tillschneider, according to Welt newspaper.
For the report’s authors, the goal is to confirm.that the AfD can indeed be banned legally.
“Until now, there has been no definitive answer to the question of whether the AfD is unconstitutional and could therefore be banned,” the project leader said, adding that the analysis “now finally provides clarity for the political sphere and society at large.”
Is there actual stomach for a ban?
However, as Remix News has written numerous times, a desire to ban the AfD is far different than applying this desire in practice. So far, the CDU has backed away from pursuing a ban against the AfD, with Chancellor Friedrich Merz going so far as to say that it “smacks too much of the elimination of political rivals.”
Specifically, he said, “Working ‘aggressively and militantly’ against the free democratic basic order must be proven. And the burden of proof lies solely with the state. That is a classic task of the executive branch. And I have always internally resisted initiating ban proceedings from within the Bundestag. That smacks too much of political competition elimination to me.”
Remix News also wrote an analysis at the time explaining why the ban of the AfD represents a clear electoral threat to the CDU.
Under German law, only the Bundestag, the Bundesrat, or the federal government can petition the Federal Constitutional Court to ban a party, and only that court can ultimately rule a party unconstitutional. The SPD, the CDU’s junior coalition party, has been openly calling for a ban, but without the CDU’s support, such an action has no chance of passing in the Bundestag.
Major victory for the AfD in court
Even if it were to pass, the Constitutional Court may reject such a petition. In February of this year, efforts to ban the AfD suffered a major blow when the Cologne Administrative Court decided the powerful domestic spy agency, the Office of the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), could not classify the federal AfD as “confirmed right-wing extremist,” at least until a full ruling was issued. However, the preliminary ruling did not bode well for the BfV and the German establishment, according to a number of legal analysts.
The judiciary stated while there was sufficient evidence that efforts against the free democratic basic order were under way within the AfD, it stated that this designation could not apply to the party as a whole, finding it was not “shaped in a way that would lead to the conclusion — based on its overall character — that there is a fundamental tendency hostile to the constitution.”
A ruling in the main proceedings is still pending, but after this ruling, Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt (CSU) called for a political rather than legal fight, saying the AfD must be “governed away, not banned away.”
At the time, AfD leader Alice Weidel also posted to X: “Not only is the Federal Office of the Protection of the Constitution no longer allowed to classify the AfD as “confirmed right-wing extremist,” but the Cologne Administrative Court has also indirectly thrown a spanner in the works for the ban fanatics with its ruling. A major victory not only for the AfD, but also for democracy and the rule of law!”
Greens jump on the new report
Regardless of the disastrous result for the left following the Cologne decision, this new report signals that those opposed to the AfD are not finished with efforts to ban the party.
The Green Party wasted no time turning the report into a call to arms. Parliamentary co-leaders Britta Haßelmann and Katharina Dröge wrote to their counterparts in the Union, SPD, and Left party, urging them to take up a motion to ban the AfD. They are convinced, their letter states, that “no further warnings are needed and the defense of our democracy cannot be postponed.”
“The AfD and its undisguised rejection of the free democratic basic order cannot be overlooked,” Haßelmann said. “We must now demonstrate the resilience of our democracy and counter its subversion with the necessary determination rooted in the rule of law.”
