Controls at German national borders: Illegal, but Dobrindt continues anyway

The federal government is violating applicable law with its border policy and ignoring court decisions. What has been clear to observers for months has now been put on paper by the Ministry of the Interior itself: State Secretary Christoph de Vries (CDU) lists in a letter to Bundestag member Helge Limburg (Greens) all the judgments that courts have made on the internal border controls that have been taking place since May 2025. In all of them, the current practice is viewed as illegal.

One day after taking office, Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt (CSU) ordered the federal police to increase controls at Germany's national borders and to turn away asylum seekers there - which violates EU law. As part of his parliamentary right to ask questions, the Limburg legal politician now asked about judgments that the government is aware of and which “evaluate the practice as legal” or “declare it unlawful”.

In the answer, State Secretary de Vries lists successful lawsuits from a total of eight people. Four cases involved controls at the borders with Austria and Luxembourg. These were declared a violation of the law by the Munich and Koblenz administrative courts. In the other cases, asylum seekers had complained against their rejection at the German-Polish border. They got justice before the Berlin Administrative Court.

“There are no known further court decisions against the rejection of asylum seekers,” writes de Vries in conclusion. The ministry has actually not won any cases so far. Nevertheless, it continues to carry out the checks and rejections illegally. Most recently, Dobrindt extended the controls, which would have expired in mid-September, by another six months until March 2027.

To justify this, his ministry repeatedly states that the judgments only relate to individual cases and that some are not yet legally binding. This is true, but in the legal debate the prevailing opinion is that current practice is not permissible even beyond the specific cases.

“Now we have it official: The government does not know of a single court decision that considers its border controls to be legal,” said the Limburg Green MP to the taz in response to the government’s answer to his question. This confirms the legal assessment that his group has taken from the start. Dobrindt must end the border controls immediately. “Otherwise he will have to accept the accusation that, as Interior Minister, he is deliberately and comprehensively violating the law.”