German police arrest political rival on inauguration day

German police arrested newly elected Alternative for Germany (AfD) politician Daniel Halemba Monday, the day he was slated to begin his five-year term in Bavarian State Parliament. Had Halemba actually taken up his seat, he would have been immune from prosecution.

AfD, which has 83 seats in German Parliament and is rising in popularity, is the largest political opponent of the ruling Social Democrats. Its populist leaders have vigorously opposed COVID-19 mandates and supported President Donald Trump. This month the party won major gains in state elections in Hesse and Bavaria, where Halemba was one of 32 AfD politicians elected.

Government leaders have ordered surveillance conducted on AfD politicians and are calling to ban the party from participating in politics due to “racism” and "extremism,” though supporting evidence was not provided. Since August, at least three AfD leaders — including the party’s two co-chairs — have been beaten or forced into hiding.

On Friday German authorities issued a warrant for 22-year-old Halemba for sedition and allegedly possessing “forbidden symbols” such as Nazi memorabilia, which is a crime in Germany. Media reports also say that neighbors of Halemba’s student fraternity, Teutonia Prag, have complained of hearing the words “sieg heil” come from the fraternity house.

The Financial Times reports that police raided the house last month and confiscated a large amount of materials, though Halemba told German media no “incriminating material” had been found.

Reports say that authorities could not initially find Halemba to arrest him and spent three days searching for him. At 8 AM Monday, just before he could assume his seat in Bavaria’s Parliament, Halemba was arrested in Stuttgart and charged with sedition and “racist abuse.”

Media reports suggest the AfD is racist because Björn Höcke, one of the AfD’s leaders, has used “Hitler-esque language,” referring to a statement he made in 2019, “When the turning point is reached, then we Germans won’t do things by halves, we will dispose of the rubbish heaps of modernity.” A journalist from the German media publication ZFD suggested the remark sounded like a quote from Mein Kampf, and Höcke was thereafter compared to Hitler.

In January, AfD Health Policy Coordinator Martin Sichert defended a Holocaust survivor who was ordered by a judge to be forcibly vaccinated against COVID-19. 

“Nobody should be forced against their will to take part in a medical experiment – of any kind, not even corona gene therapy – especially not vulnerable people undergoing psychiatric treatment,” said Sichert in a statement. “Article 2 of the Basic Law protects the right to physical integrity. This right is taken away from the elderly woman. The fact that Inna Zhvanetskaya is also a Holocaust survivor makes this case even more outrageous.”

In August German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier was among those who called to ban AfD.

“[W]e all have it in our hands to put those who despise our democracy in their place,” Steinmeier said after the country’s domestic spy chief warned about AfD “spreading hate” against minorities.

“We see a considerable number of protagonists in this party that spread hate against all types of minorities here in Germany,” said Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) President Thomas Haldenwang.

A Social Democrats co-leader has said that AfD should be banned from politics if BfV declares the party to be a group of “proven Right-wing extremists.”

Nonprofit organization German Institute for Human Rights claims “the AfD have reached a degree of dangerousness that they can be banned according to the constitution.”

German media are encouraging the possible ban. "The AfD has become more and more radicalized. It’s time to defend democracy with better weapons," wrote Der Spiegel. 

The Telegraph acknowledges that “[w]hen the Nazis came to power, they banned all other parties.”