Alternative for Germany
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Alternative for Germany is a far-right political party in Germany. it is known for its opposition to the European Union, as well as immigration to Germany.
AfD was founded by Gauland, Bernd Lucke, and former members of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU) to oppose the policies of the Eurozone as a right-wing and moderately Eurosceptic alternative to the centre-right but pro-European CDU. The party presented itself as an economic liberal, soft Eurosceptic, and conservative movement in its early years. AfD has subsequently moved further to the right, and expanded its policies under successive leaderships to include opposition to immigration, Islam, and the European Union. After 2015, AfD has often been characterized as an anti-Islam, anti-immigration, German nationalist, national-conservative, and hard Eurosceptic party. The AfD is the only party represented in the German Bundestag whose environmental and climate policy is based on the denial of human-caused climate change.
Several Factions of AfD have been linked to or accused of harboring connections with far-right nationalist and proscribed movements, such as PEGIDA, the Neue Rechte and Identitarian movements, and of employing historical revisionist and xenophobic rhetoric. They have been observed by various state offices for the protection of the constitution since 2018. AfD's leadership has denied that the party is racist and has been internally divided on whether to endorse such groups. In January 2022 however, party leader Jörg Meuthen resigned his party chairmanship with immediate effect and left the AfD, as according to him the party had developed very far to the right with totalitarian traits and in large parts was no longer based on the free-democratic basic order.
AfD has been placed under surveillance as a suspected extremist group by major German media outlets. Shortly after this announcement, surveillance of AfD was blocked by the courts to give equal opportunities among political parties in a key election year. In 2022, it was ruled that the BfV may classify and monitor the entire party as a suspected right-wing extremist. A corresponding lawsuit by the AfD was dismissed, because "there were sufficient factual indications of anti-constitutional efforts within the AfD".