AfD files lawsuit against classification

The AfD Saxony has filed a lawsuit against the classification as a right-wing extremist organization by the state constitution protection agency. At the same time, the party wants to force the release of a corresponding report by the constitutional protectors. The document is "bizarrely" classified, said party leader Jörg Urban in Dresden on Friday. We are living in a situation where the AfD is figuratively being called a robber without being told who it robbed, when and where. This is not acceptable.

The AfD had already announced legal action against the categorization shortly before Christmas. Now it has announced that it has done so. Lawyer Joachim Keiler, Vice State Chairman of the AfD in Saxony, presented the confirmation of receipt from the Dresden Administrative Court. In addition, the State Office for the Protection of the Constitution is to be prohibited by temporary injunction from describing the Saxony AfD as "definitely right-wing extremist" until the report is published. "We know that there are no extremists among our members," said Urban.

According to Urban, this is only the first step. If the Office for the Protection of the Constitution and the Ministry of the Interior uphold the accusation of extremism afterwards, this will be clarified in a trial on the merits. The AfD cannot deal with the accusations if it is not even aware of them. His party wants to know what is in the report and wants to debate it publicly. Urban suspected a political maneuver behind the classification. The aim was to influence the will of voters in the super election year of 2024.

In December 2023, the LfV Saxony classified the Saxon AfD regional association as a "confirmed right-wing extremist movement". According to LfV President Dirk-Martin Christian, there is no longer any doubt about the party's orientation. He sees the AfD in the Free State as being networked with other players in the right-wing extremist scene. After Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt, the Saxony AfD is the third state association with such a classification. According to Urban, the classification has not harmed his AfD. He pointed to rising membership figures and an increase in donations since then.

Urban also rejected accusations against his party in connection with a secret meeting of right-wing forces in Potsdam in November 2023. The media outlet Correctiv had reported on this. Martin Sellner, a former head of the far-right Identitarian movement in Austria, had also spoken there, according to his own statements about "remigration". When right-wing extremists use the term, they usually mean that a large number of people of foreign origin should leave the country - even under duress.

"We don't have a credibility problem. We want remigration, as almost all parties now do," said Urban. But we want it within a legal and humane framework. In the media, however, the AfD is accused of things that have nothing to do with reality.