At the start of the European election campaign the leading politician of the Left Party Carola Rackete gave a speech in Berlin. Among other things she accuses the party Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) of the following: “The AfD is threatening to set fire to our democracy: They are the arsonists who are planning to deport our neighbors.”
Since the beginning of the refugee crisis in 2014 as well as the war in Ukraine and Gaza the debate on the deportation of refugees has been a contentious issue in European politics. According to its own statements, the party DIE LINKE (engl.: The Left) stands for an open, humane migration and asylum policy based on solidarity, as can be seen in the party’s European election manifesto this year. Carola Rackete, the Left Party’s lead candidate herself, has been active in civil sea rescue on the Mediterranean for several years as a captain for the “Sea-Watch” initiative. The party is also clearly opposed to “Fortress Europe” and the outsourcing of asylum procedures to third countries.
The AfD party’s stance on asylum, migration and refugee policy is contrary to that of DIE LINKE. In addition, the AfD is classified as a suspected right-wing extremist party at federal level by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution.
In this year’s European election manifesto, the AfD has made a clear demand on how refugees should be dealt with within Germany: “Anyone who has no right to be in Germany must leave. We will consistently carry out deportations to the extent necessary.” Maximilian Krah, the former top candidate for the AfD, has also taken a clear stance on his TikTok account on several occasions, calling for tough border and coastal controls by Frontex. In his TikTok, Krah even calls for the use of so-called “pushbacks”. This measure is highly controversial as it prevents refugees from applying for asylum shortly before or after their arrival. In a pushback, for example, refugee boats are towed back out to sea before docking on the mainland. This measure would actively violate current EU law.
Other politicians from other parties are also calling for deportations, but without pushbacks. The German Federal Interior Minister, Nancy Faeser, said the following in a plenary debate on the “Better Return Act”: “But it is also clear that anyone who does not have the right to stay in Germany must leave Germany again. This is a prerequisite for migration to be accepted in society as a whole and for integration to work.”
During the election campaign, former AfD lead candidate Maximilian Krah caused damage within the European Parliament: His statement in an interview that members of the SS troops during the Nazi era were “not all criminals” led to a split in the “Identity and Democracy” European parliamentary group. The group was made up of the AfD, the French party Rassemblement National, the Italian Lega and the Freedom Party of Austria and had a strong right-wing political orientation. In addition, Krah recently became embroiled in an espionage scandal and was banned from appearing by the AfD.
Carola Rackete’s statement “The AfD is threatening to set our democracy on fire: They are the arsonists who plan to deport the neighbors.” is a “legitimate but exaggerated expression of opinion”, according to Kai Arzheimer. He is a political scientist at the University of Mainz, whose research focuses on right-wing extremism, among other things. Arzheimer points out that mass deportations are not planned in the AfD’s current European election program. However, this topic has already come up in speeches and written statements.
In its 2021 federal election manifesto, the AfD called for a deportation offensive and a national and supranational migration agenda.
Arzheimer emphasizes that the AfD is also closely networked with the Identitäre Bewegung (engl.: Identitarian Movement) in short IB, which regularly calls for mass deportations. The IB is a group of neo-right-wing and far-right activists that has already been classified by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution as definitely far-right. A joint meeting of IB and AfD members took place just last year: In a villa near Potsdam, they jointly fantasized about a “master plan” to deport “non-assimilated Germans” to the “mother states”. Following harsh criticism from society and politicians, the AfD published a position paper in which the party defined the term “remigration” for itself. The scandal surrounding the secret meeting in Potsdam has damaged relations within the Identity and Democracy Group at European level. It was one of the first major incidents that led to a group split before the European elections.
Conclusion
Due to the fact that the AfD’s current European election manifesto does not explicitly mention mass deportations, it is not possible to make a clear judgment on Carola Rackete’s statement. Individual actors such as AfD top candidate Maximilian Krah occasionally express more drastic views on measures, but his opinion does not in principle speak for the entire party. Even if AfD members are secretly making plans for mass deportations with the Identitarian Movement, it cannot be unequivocally confirmed that every AfD member is behind them. “It is difficult to decide whether this can be attributed to the party as a whole,” says political scientist Kai Arzheimer. The statement made by Carola Rackete, a leading politician of the Left Party, cannot therefore be verified.
RESEARCH | ARTICLE | Christian Steinbach, Hochschule der Medien, Stuttgart (Germany)
Leave your comments, thoughts and suggestions in the box below. Take note: your response is moderated.
