Calls within Germany’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) to reconsider its rigid stance towards the right-wing Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) are growing louder, particularly from the party’s eastern branches.
A growing number of CDU figures from Thuringia, Saxony, and Brandenburg have recently publicly questioned the so-called Brandmauer—the “firewall” policy that forbids cooperation with the anti-immigration AfD.
The debate, first reignited by former CDU General Secretary Peter Tauber and ex-Defence Minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, has now spread rapidly across the party’s eastern federations, where the AfD dominates local politics.
In several eastern states, the AfD is already the strongest political force, and recent opinion polls place it ahead nationwide. In Saxony-Anhalt, where the next regional election will take place next September, the party could reach 40%.
Andreas Bühl, CDU parliamentary group leader in the Thuringian parliament, said: “Those who align their politics solely according to who supports them confuse morality with politics.” Bühl’s remarks mark a notable shift: only a year ago, he had been one of the most vocal opponents of any engagement with the AfD.
Similar sentiments came from Saxony, where CDU politicians face intense competition from the right-wing party.
Christian Hartmann, head of the CDU’s parliamentary group in Dresden, said his party must “find and consistently implement its own position beyond all firewall debates.”
CDU regional General Secretary Tom Unger went further, arguing that the strategy of isolating the AfD had clearly failed, stating
The way all other parties have dealt with the AfD in recent years has not made it weaker.
In Brandenburg, Bundestag member Saskia Ludwig has long urged a pragmatic approach. “We need to treat the AfD differently,” she said. “That means first granting it democratic rights such as committee chairmanships and vice-presidential posts. This already exists in several states.” Ludwig added that the “firewall” policy only strengthened both AfD and the far-left Die Linke: “We must engage with the AfD on substance rather than moving further left.”
Other German parties have systematically excluded the AfD from leadership positions in the Bundestag, blocking its access to chair and vice-chair roles in key parliamentary committees despite its now-substantial electoral strength.
This means that although the AfD is the largest opposition force in the country, it remains shut out of decision-making leadership, its millions of voters denied real representation.
Zoltán Kottász is a journalist for europeanconservative.com, based in Budapest. He worked for many years as a journalist and as the editor of the foreign desk at the Hungarian daily, Magyar Nemzet. He focuses primarily on European politics.
