Germany is becoming radicalized in its eastern regions. The strongest line is drawn by the AfD’s leading candidate in Thuringia, Björn Höcke.
Björn Höcke is Germany’s most controversial politician.
The German intelligence service has defined the 52-year-old AfD politician as a threat to the constitutional order because of his extreme right.
Even the leadership of his own party has considered Höcke too radical, although the Alternative for Germany (AfD) is an extreme party as a whole.
However, Höcke has not received departure passes because he is one of the most popular figures in the party. The AfD is predicted to win the state election under Höcke for the first time in the party’s history today, Sunday, in Thuringia.
The radicalization of the entire AfD is personified in the strictly anti-immigration Höcke. The party that started as a Eurocritic a decade ago has drifted increasingly to the right in recent years.
In this story, we tell you why Björn Höcke is such a controversial figure in Germany.
A history teacher who cultivates Nazi references
Although Höcke has made his political career in Thuringia in the former East German region, he was born and grew up in the western parts of Germany.
In Sunday’s election, the 52-year-old father of four is the AfD’s top candidate in Thuringia for the third time in a row.
Höcke, who worked as a history teacher, has gained national attention above all for his statements about history.
In 2017, Höcke called Berlin’s memorial to the Holocaust, i.e. the murdered Jews, a “monument of shame”.
In the same speech, Höcke demanded that negative memories of the past be stopped in Germany.
Höcke also campaigned in Sunday’s election by defending German patriotism:
The Nazi past is an extremely sensitive subject in Germany. The country that murdered six million Jews has tried to deal with its Nazi-era crimes as thoroughly as possible.
Höcke purposely pokes at this topic.
Fascist by court decision
Even Höcke’s party mates did not distinguish his writings from the dictator of Nazi Germany Adolf Hitler from the texts when the issue was tested five years ago.
At that time, a journalist from public broadcaster ZDF read quotes from Höcke’s book to members of the AfD, and they could not say who had written them.
Last year, the former Federal President of Germany Joachim Gauck was directly compared to Höcke by the propaganda minister of Nazi Germany to Joseph Goebbels German newspaper Der Spiegel in the interview.
This is exceptional in Germany. It has not been appropriate to compare politicians to the Nazis.
However, Gauck could do so because in 2019 the court ruledthat Höcke can be called a fascist.
In May of this year, Höcke was fined for publicly using the Nazi German SA slogan “All for Germany”.
In July, Höcke was sentenced a second time because he said the beginning of a slogan at a party event and shouted the end with his audience.
Höcke has defended himself by saying that he did not know that it was a slogan of the SA forces. He said he was excited Donald Trump’s “America First!” – about the slogan.
The judge did not believe the former history teacher.
Export of fundamental rights demanded
The German constitution outlines that a citizen can lose the rights secured by the constitution if they are used against the democratic system.
Citing this, hundreds of thousands of Germans signed a petition demanding Höcke’s eligibility to be removed from office.
A ban could be legally possible, but the threshold for taking away basic personal rights is high in Germany.
The matter has been attempted four times in the 1960s and 1970s, but without success.
Höcke will not be able to lead the state with these prospects, even if his party wins the election.
So far, no other party has agreed to cooperate with the AfD, especially its extreme wing.
The growth of AfD’s popularity in eastern Germany was discussed on Friday in ‘s Uutispodcast: