The federal intelligence agency said that the populist political party aims to exclude certain population groups from ‘equal participation in society.’
Germany’s domestic intelligence agency has officially classified the right-wing party Alternative for Germany (AfD) as extremist.
Having regarded the AfD as a suspected extremist movement since 2021, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), on May 2 designated the populist party as “right-wing extremist,” following an “intensive and comprehensive expert examination.”
This means that intelligence services now have the right to keep it under surveillance.
BfV said in a statement that AfD’s approach to ethnicity is “not compatible with the free democratic basic order.”
According to BfV’s statement, AfD does not consider German nationals with a migration background from Muslim-origin countries as equal members of the German people.
BfV Vice President Sinan Selen and Vice President Dr. Silke Willems in a joint statement said: “We have come to the conviction that the Alternative for Germany is a definitively right-wing extremist movement.”
Certain factions of the AfD such as its youth wing had already been classified as extremist.
In the party’s first response to the report, the leader of a regional parliamentary group, Anton Baron, said: “It is sad to see the state of democracy in our country when the established parties now resort to the most politically questionable means to act against the strongest opposition party.”
“This is solely about maintaining the power of the old parties,” he said separately in a post on X. “The fight against the AfD has become a fight against democracy itself. We won’t be intimidated!”
Hier geht es ausschließlich um den Machterhalt der Altparteien. Der Kampf gegen die AfD ist zum Kampf gegen die Demokratie selbst geworden.
— Anton Baron, MdL (@AntonBaronAfD) May 2, 2025
Wir lassen uns nicht einschüchtern!#Verfassungsschutz #Faeser #AfD #Einstufung #rechtsextremistisch #gesichert #BfV #weisungsgebunden pic.twitter.com/wOIwCcZNkZ
AfD Deputy Federal Spokesman Stephan Brandner told The Epoch Times that the classification was “absurd.”
Brandner said that this has “nothing to do with law and order, and is a purely political in the fight of the cartel parties against the AfD.”
The other parties have failed across the board in recent years and driven Germany into the abyss, Brandner said.
“The people know this and therefore vote for us,” he said.
By Owen Evans
