Alliance exerts pressure for an AfD ban - launch of the campaign “Defend human dignity - ban the AfD now!”

With the campaign “Defend human dignity - ban the AfD now!”, a civil society alliance is calling on the representatives of the Federal Government, the Bundestag and the Bundesrat to submit an application for a ban to the Federal Constitutional Court.

"We came together at the beginning of the year because we realized that we must not waste any more time. The revelations of the Correctiv investigation mobilized us and millions of other people and prompted us to launch this campaign,” says Julia Dück from the AfD Ban Now! campaign, ”because there are enough reasons to ban the AfD: The AfD is a very real danger to the lives of countless people in this country. It propagates racist discrimination and thus attacks human dignity.”

The first goal is to achieve a parliamentary majority of MPs in the Bundestag who agree to a ban motion. The alliance plans to address all members of parliament from the democratic parties and will call on them to take a public stance. The debate about a democratic and diverse society will be decided not only in a ban of the AfD but also in the hearts and minds of the people in this country. This is why the AfD Ban Now! campaign is also supporting the protests against the AfD's federal party conference in Essen, for example, as well as protests before and after the state elections in the fall. The alliance sees the AfD ban not only as a legal dispute, but also as a civil society one.

At the press conference to launch the campaign, other social voices also clearly position themselves in favor of banning the AfD:

Prof. Dr. Jens-Christian Wagner, Director of the Buchenwald Memorial Foundation:

“In a democratic constitutional state, a party ban must always be the last resort. This is not least a lesson learned from the crimes of National Socialism. Another lesson is that anti-constitutional parties must be deprived of the opportunity to abuse democracy in order to abolish it. The Federal Government, Bundestag and Bundesrat are therefore called upon to finally give serious legal consideration to banning the AfD, which is openly right-wing extremist and anti-constitutional.”

Ulrich Schneider, Managing Director of the Paritätischer Gesamtverband:

“We would never have thought it possible that 75 years after the adoption of our Basic Law in Germany, a party would once again question the equal value and equal worth of all people and that vulnerable groups in particular, for whom the Paritätische stands as a welfare association, would once again be massively attacked or marginalized, be they migrants, disabled or queer people. We should have learned from our history and must fight back.”

Naomi Henkel-Guembel, survivor of the anti-Semitically motivated, racist and right-wing terrorist attack in Halle on Yom Kippur 2019:

“The tragedy in Halle is one in a long line of deadly attacks fueled by hate - and the success of the AfD in the European elections shows how deeply dangerous worldviews have penetrated our society. There is no room for indifference and complacency: the AfD has joined in the shooting in Kassel, Halle and Hanau. NOW is the time to take decisive action against hatred and intolerance. Before it is - once again - too late.”

Karim El-Helaifi, board member of the new German organizations:

“It has been clear to our communities, not just since the revelations of the deportation plans, that the AfD is pursuing a deeply racist and anti-democratic agenda. Our Basic Law provides us with protective instruments for precisely such endeavors, which we should make use of while we still can.”

Dr. Lukas Theune, Republican Lawyers' Association:

“The ban on political parties under Article 21 (2) of the Basic Law has high threshhold for good reasons. Nevertheless, I believe that banning the AfD is legally viable and politically necessary. The basis for banning the AfD is given in view of its program and political actions."