The EU could hit the German state of Thuringia with €1.5 billion in funding cuts if it exercises democracy and installs the wrong government led by the Alternative for Germany (AfD).
The proposal to cut funding to the entire German state comes from the influential Jacques Delors Centre (JDC), a think tank at the Hertie School in Berlin, with a former EU commission advisor, Luise Quaritsch, suggesting cutting EU funding if the AfD comes to power.
She writes: “Right-wing populist and extreme parties are gaining support across Europe,” and the consequences of this can be seen “in Hungary, Poland and Slovakia.”
In the case of Hungary and Poland, the EU has already been active using its “rule-of-law” instrument, which is a relatively new tool Brussels gained back in 2020. It has allowed Brussels to freeze billions of funding to Hungary in an attempt to oust Viktor Orbán’s government from power.
However, she argues that such a tool is not only suitable for states, but also for regions within nations, writing that Brussels can “use almost all of its instruments to take action against the authoritarian government of a federal state.”
She writes that the EU should cut all of Thuringia’s funds, totaling €1.5 billion, which it was supposed to receive from 2021 to 2027.
“This sum could have a serious impact on Thuringia’s regional and economic development and thus put a state government under pressure,” she writes.
These EU funds make up 15 percent of the state’s structural funds. She writes that the decision should still be taken carefully, but she argues that the EU has such power. She points out that such a tool has already been used in Poland against regions that had alleged “LGBT-free zones.”
Quaritsch recommends using Articles 258 and 260 TFEU to convict a state government that does not implement EU laws promptly or fails to uphold fundamental rights. However, such procedures can take years. She thus says that using the “conditionality mechanism,” which has also been used against Hungary and Poland, could help the EU immediately freeze funds.
AfD’s first-place finish in Thuringia and close second-place finish in Saxony have sent the political establishment in Berlin and Brussels into a meltdown, which has already led to a range of threats.
If the EU does decide to cut funding to Thuringia, such a move could also backfire. For one, Thuringia is an east German state, and many voters there may react with outrage if such an action is taken, including Christian Democratic (CDU) voters. Furthermore, Germany as a whole is a net contributor to the EU. While Thuringia is not as rich as some of the states in western Germany, voters and the state are not so dependent on EU largesse as other Eastern European nations.
