Saxony-Anhalt's future state parliament president: The rush of money

A number of invitations to the state parliament of Saxony-Anhalt had already been sent out in autumn 2024. Volunteers should come together there for a ceremony, directly in the plenary hall in Magdeburg, invited by all MPs. A thank you, like last year. But then the CDU had the whole thing canceled in the Council of Elders. Because of the AfD's boycott of the event - they were disturbed by the fact that a CSD activist had also received an award the previous year.

AfD parliamentary group leader Tobias Rausch said that the ceremony was “fundamentally critical, as it was last held” because of the “special awards”. His group became clearer on social media: volunteering was only recognized with a “woken zeitgeist”, with “ideological blinders” and people wouldn’t take part. The other factions saw these statements as a “slap in the face of the volunteers”.

This episode is a foretaste of what it could be like in the Saxony-Anhalt state parliament from October 6th. Then, when parliament meets for the first time in the new legislative period, after the AfD's 43.8 percent victory. And when a right-wing extremist is elected President of Parliament for the first time in the Federal Republic. Tobias Rausch, 35 years old, AfD man from the very beginning.

After his election, Rausch would occupy one of the highest-ranking offices in Saxony-Anhalt, represent the parliament externally and would have sovereignty over the state parliament administration. The AfD was already the strongest force in Thuringia in 2024. At that time, however, none of the other parties voted for the AfD candidate. In Saxony-Anhalt, however, the BSW is now freely declaring that it supports the AfD proposal for the President of Parliament. This is “parliamentary practice”. Intoxication? He is competent.

The AfD faction itself unanimously nominated Rausch for the post of president. And it turns the election into a test balloon for the formation of a government. How reliable are the BSW’s promises? Are there CDU MPs who vote for the AfD man? Ulrich Siegmund wants to stand for election as Prime Minister in mid-December and sounds like he will receive a majority in the first round of voting. That would be the next turning point.

Before the first state parliament session, Rausch presented himself as a moderate. The fact that he is boycotting the thank-you event for volunteers raises doubts, and not only that. Rausch is not an ideological whipper, but one of the careerists in the party. But someone who has represented every right-wing extremist volte of this radical regional association.

Tobias Rausch was born in Lower Franconia, but his family then moved to Staßfurt in Saxony-Anhalt, a good 20,000 souls. After training as a real estate agent, Rausch set up a housing company there, played a lot of football and is still the chairman and sponsor of two local clubs. He was elected to the local council of the Protestant church - but left the church after it refused AfD donations.

Rausch joined the AfD very early, in May 2013, as a 23-year-old, shortly after the regional association was founded. His father did the same, and he also later made a career in the party.

Rausch Junior said at the time that his goal was a “politics close to home” that “focuses on the interests of the majority and not the interests of minorities.” He became the AfD's youth representative, rose quickly, and moved into the city council and district council. When two state leaders resigned after a few months in 2014 following disagreements, Rausch became interim state chairman of the AfD. As a result, he supported a party radical for the presidency, who also won it: André Poggenburg. A Höcke ally who took to the streets with right-wing extremist comrades and once called the former deputy head of the Central Council of Jews, Michel Friedman, a “slimy something.”

Tobias Rausch carried all of this with him. In 2016, Rausch entered the state parliament and found a confidante there: Ulrich Siegmund. In the party, “Tobi” was considered a hard-working organizational talent; he rose to the position of parliamentary group vice-president and later to parliamentary group manager. Rausch became a central part of a clique around Siegmund, which was internally called the “Pokerrunde”. Rausch took care of finances and really wanted to be on the finance committee: “So that you can see where the funding is going.”

Despite his moderate image, the Staßfurt resident also represents the ethnic ideology of the AfD regional association, which will be classified as right-wing extremist by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution from 2023 - which Rausch dismisses as "constructed". In the state parliament he rails against “left-green eco-mania” and against “old parties” that “open up the social systems to millions of strangers”; Rausch insults ARD and ZDF as “propaganda instruments of the status quo”. When the right-wing extremist Compact magazine was initially banned in the summer of 2024, Rausch was upset that “unwelcome government critics were being silenced”.

And he also supports his party's loyalty to Russia. When Vladimir Putin begins his full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the state parliament member plays foreign policy, points to Russian “security concerns” and warns against “one-sided blame.” NATO has advanced “to Russia’s doorstep.” “This broken promise is what angers Russia.”

As early as April 2022, Rausch is calling for the resumption of relations with Russia in culture, science and education. At the same time, he advocates “special classes” for Ukrainian students. In order to “prepare refugee children as best as possible for their return”.

Nevertheless, many in the party see Rausch as a pragmatist. For example, the AfD likes to denounce a self-service mentality among the hated “old parties”. Rausch himself takes it to the extreme. In December 2025, he traveled to New York with an AfD delegation and his wife, who is employed by the AfD for 6,000 euros a month, at taxpayer expense. Rausch temporarily hired seven employees in the state parliament, including four footballers from SV 09 Staßfurt, to which he belongs. Rausch's three siblings worked for an AfD member of the Bundestag, his brother-in-law worked for another member - who didn't even recognize him in a photo presented by ZDF. In an interview with the taz, Tobias Rausch said that he now only employs one footballer in the office - and only his sister works for the AfD in the Bundestag.

In addition to his work as a member of parliament, Rausch continues to earn money from his real estate company “as a paid side job”. If you call about current apartment advertisements, you will go straight to the cell phone number of managing director Tobias Rausch. According to its own information, the company manages 176 apartments, many of them in Staßfurt, and the company also takes care of caretaker activities. When asked by taz, Rausch said that he did not have to disclose the amount of his additional income because the apartments were his property and therefore asset management.

Rausch's reputation as a businessman is mixed: "If you have water in the basement, then no one will come," say angry online reviews of Rausch's company. Or: "Be careful!! Please read the rental agreements carefully! Try to rip someone off!!"

This text first appeared in wochentaz, our weekly newspaper from the left!

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The impression is: Tobias Rausch takes everything he can get. And now the office of President of Parliament. The position is well endowed with a double diet, currently more than 18,000 euros per month. And he no longer wants to award the two vice positions based on the size of the parliamentary group, but rather based on favorability: “Whoever chooses our candidate as President of the State Parliament will receive our support in the election of the Vice President.”

For the AfD, a state parliament president would be a further step towards political change. The party could thus fire the parliamentary director, appoint the state auditor and the data protection officer. The AfD parliamentary president could pursue symbolic foreign policy, travel to Moscow, China or Trump. It is conceivable that he would misuse the state parliament for meetings of the New Right. He could also dispose of supposedly “degenerate” art from the state parliament and promote ethnic culture. The president also exercises domestic authority and police power in the state parliament. Once he sits in his chair, he will probably stay: the president can only be voted out with a two-thirds majority.

No real control of the state government could be expected from Rausch. Even before the first session, the AfD tried to reshape the state parliament according to its ideas. With the BSW, she implemented a seating arrangement in which the AfD itself sits in the middle of the plenum and the Greens sit on the far right. The Greens offices should also move out of the main building of the state parliament; the AfD wanted one more seat in the committees. The party has since moved away from this.

Behind the scenes, AfD masterminds assure that they are not using intoxication to create a riot, but rather are striving for a course of normalization. Rausch is also one of those who are currently holding talks with the BSW and with individual CDU MPs. As parliamentary group leader, Rausch has good connections with the CDU and is said to have gotten along well with the last CDU parliamentary president. Years ago, Rausch said about the CDU that they “exchange information, go out to lunch or dinner together.” The AfD is a “natural” ally of the CDU.

Rausch claims to have held discussions with 10 of the 15 CDU representatives in the new state parliament. “Several people” allegedly agreed to co-elect Ulrich Siegmund. But the CDU vehemently denies that there could be defectors.

The fact that the AfD has repeatedly insulted the CDU as an “old party” in recent years is not likely to help. Intoxication also became noticeable here. In March 2024, for example, he had a war of words with the then Vice President of the State Parliament, Anne-Marie Keding, a CDU woman. “Are you crazy?!” Rausch called out to her. “Shame on you!” Keding then gave him a call to order. At least that can no longer happen to Rausch from Tuesday. Then he is the one who distributes calls to order.