The
nationalist AfD has promised to file a motion to expel controversial legislator
Wolfgang Gedeon from Baden-Württemberg’s parliament. Gedeon has called Judaism
an “enemy” of the West and downplayed the Holocaust.
The populist Alternative
for Germany (AfD) was set to make a move to oust controversial lawmaker
Wolfgang Gedeon from the state parliament of Baden-Württemberg. After initial
hesitance to penalize Gedeon over his antisemitic statements, party spokesman
Jörg Meuthen said the AfD would file a motion in court on Tuesday to have him
removed from office.
After the Stuttgart
court has received the brief, the nationalists said, they would give Gedeon
five days to leave of his own accord; otherwise they would force him out with a
majority vote.
Meuthen, who is also a
lawmaker in Baden-Württemberg on top of acting as federal party spokesman, has
said that should the AfD fail to expel Gedeon, he would resign himself.
The charges against the
doctor-turned-politician stem from writings he published several years ago
where he argues against the existence of the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of
Europe in Berlin, saying that “certain crimes” should not be given too
much prominence. He also called Judaism the “domestic enemy” of the
“Christian West,” while Islam was the “external enemy.”
While finally taking
issue with Gedeon’s remarks, the AfD continued its stance against Islam on
Tuesday with party leader
Frauke Petry saying
that the West was “threatened” by “increasing Muslim
immigration.”
Despite nearly constant
infighting since the party was founded as a Euroskeptic, financially
conservative group in 2013, the AfD has made huge gains in recent regional
elections and is now represented in half of Germany’s 16 state legislatures.
At its party convention
in April, the AfD voted to adopt the stance that “Islam is not part of Germany,”
as part of its first official manifesto, drawing fierce criticism at home and
abroad.
