Leaked AfD emails: Are there consequences now?

There are tens of thousands of internal AfD emails that are now public. News, some of which was years ago, but some of which were only a few weeks ago. There is still no final overview of the content and a lot still needs to be checked. But the picture that is already emerging is that of a party in which racist insults are part of the normal tone, in which Nazi references are played with, pals with right-wing extremist groups, trips to Russia are planned or creative ways of dealing with party donations are discussed.

None of this shakes the image that exists of the AfD so far. On the contrary: this exact image has existed for years. Because the AfD is not hiding anything. You just have to listen to their officials talk about how they want to “dispose of people in Anatolia” or how they announce “well-tempered cruelty”. You can openly watch them as they court the preacher of “remigration,” Martin Sellner, or as they provide their relatives with jobs at taxpayer expense. None of this happens in secret.

And all of this has been documented for years not only through classifications by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, but also most recently in a meticulous report by the Society for Civil Rights, which came to the conclusion that the AfD is unconstitutional.

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The question is: what follows from this? A party ban process? A withdrawal of party funding? Action against particularly radical regional associations? The bitter answer: Nothing has resulted from this so far.

What follows from doing nothing: an ever-increasing normalization of the AfD, which ensures that the party in Saxony-Anhalt is on the verge of its first state government. Despite all of the AfD's self-exposures, which are presented again in the emails that have now been leaked. Or because of.

What else does it take to shake things up? To at least set up a working group to examine a ban procedure? Doing this is the responsibility of the Federal Council, Bundestag or Federal Government. Finally act!