More Than 40% of Germans Against AfD Ban

While the leftist and liberal parties seek to block Germany’s poll-leading right-wing populists—citing threats to democracy—they lack the parliamentary support needed for such a measure.

By PantheraLeo1359531 – Own work, CC BY 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=95452561

While the leftist and liberal parties seek to block Germany’s poll-leading right-wing populists—citing threats to democracy—they lack the parliamentary support needed for such a measure.

More Germans opposed banning the right-wing party Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) than support it, according to a recent opinion poll.

A survey by Insa shows that 43% of respondents oppose such a ban, while 35% are in favour.

This finding comes as in recent months, the AfD has been steadily gaining voter support and, as of October, even overtook the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) in popularity.

Despite that, the SPD, Greens, and the Left Party (Die Linke) in Germany are pushing to suppress the right-wing AfD, citing Article 21 of the Basic Law, which allows a party to be banned if it threatens the democratic order. However, the CDU/CSU alliance opposes such legal proceedings, and without it, the three parties urging the ban cannot achieve the parliamentary majority needed to move forward.