State elections
SPD leader Klingbeil considers AfD candidates to be right-wing extremists
SPD leader Lars Klingbeil: “The AfD is a very dangerous party because it agitates, polarizes and wants to divide this country.” photo
© Kay Nietfeld/dpa
“Anyone who takes responsibility in the AfD… is, in my opinion, a convinced right-wing extremist”: SPD leader Klingbeil wants to win back voters who have been disappointed by democratic parties.
The SPD chairman Lars Klingbeil sees the elections next year and the approval for them AfD as “big challenges”. “We have to work hard to make the AfD smaller and the democratic parties larger,” Klingbeil told the “Böhme-Zeitung” (Thursday). “This works best if we solve the tasks set before us and take people’s everyday concerns seriously.” This ranges from affordable energy to good daycare and good care.
There will be European elections at the beginning of June, and the state parliaments in Saxony, Thuringia and Brandenburg will also be re-elected in the fall. The AfD has recently been ahead in surveys in all three countries. The AfD state association in Saxony was recently classified by the state Office for the Protection of the Constitution as a confirmed right-wing extremist effort; in Thuringia, the state AfD has been classified this way for a long time.
Klingbeil: The AfD’s program content is right-wing extremist
“Anyone who takes responsibility in the AfD and applies for a state or federal parliamentary mandate is, in my opinion, a convinced right-wing extremist,” said Klingbeil. This is clear from the party’s program content. “But when citizens tell me at the information stand that they would now vote for the AfD because they are angry with the democratic parties, they are not immediately right-wing.” The SPD chairman said he wanted to win back these disappointed citizens politically. “We have to work hard for that. The AfD is a very dangerous party because it agitates, polarizes and wants to divide this country.”
When asked about a possible ban procedure, Klingbeil said that, in his opinion, the debate about it was increasing. “But in Germany there are rightly high hurdles for a ban procedure.” He has “deep trust in our security authorities, who observe and evaluate developments and – if they consider the limit to have been exceeded – propose a ban procedure.”
The political fight against the AfD
As a politician, his job is the political fight against the AfD. “It’s about questions like: what does the AfD mean for children with disabilities, what does the AfD mean for secure jobs, what with regard to the European Union, from which the AfD wants to leave and would thus endanger the jobs of millions of people. The “The political fight against the AfD is one of the most important tasks for German social democracy,” said Klingbeil.