Overview
- In a WELT-TV interview, AfD co-leader Alice Weidel likened the Verfassungsschutz to the Stasi, called its staff “schmierige Stasi-Spitzel,” and derided Thuringia’s chief Stephan Kramer by his appearance.
- Kramer told Handelsblatt and WELT that the comparison “mocks Stasi victims” and argued the agency acts under the rule of law to protect the democratic order.
- He said Weidel’s personal barbs are meant to intimidate officials, citing “subtle antisemitic hostility” and AI-manipulated images circulated to demean him in Thuringia.
- Thuringia’s Interior Minister Georg Maier rejected Weidel’s phrasing, noting she declined to disavow the banned SA slogan “Alles für Deutschland” during the same interview.
- The confrontation comes as a federal plan to classify the AfD as a confirmed right-wing extremist endeavor remains paused by a lawsuit, while several state branches hold stricter classifications.