Tino Chrupalla, who leads the conservative, antiglobalist Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) together with Alice Weidel, has said that Postbank, a retail banking division of massive financial institution Deutsche Bank, has terminated his account because he’s an AfD member.
In a rather rare appearance on the public broadcasting television network ARD on Tuesday, September 26th, the AfD federal spokesman appeared alongside the Thuringian CDU top candidate Mario Voigt, the Green Party politician Katrin Göring-Eckardt, two journalists from Spiegel and Zeit, and the host of the show, Louis Klamroth, Apollo News reported.
The topic of discussion was “Prejudice in the West and constant frustration in the East: Hardly a chance for German unity?”
When asked by Klamroth whether he frequently encounters stereotypes about East Germans, Chrupalla dismissed the notion, arguing that they do not play as much of a role these days. Then, the AfD chief shifted the topic of discussion, saying that today, Germans living in the eastern part of the country find themselves in a situation that feels eerily familiar to the days of the GDR, particularly with respect to the political and economic consequences that one faces for taking a position that deviates from the mainstream narrative.
“On Friday my account was canceled by Postbank because I am an AfD member,” Chrupalla said, adding that this not only evinces how the AfD is “excluded and marginalized” from society but also that people are no longer permitted to express their opinions freely in Germany, TAG 24 reported.
Responding to a press inquiry from the daily newspaper Die Welt, a spokesman from Postbank said they refrain from providing comments on individual customer relationships due to banking secrecy. Nevertheless, the possibility of account termination due to political affiliation cannot be dismissed, as the spokesman noted: “In general, both parties involved have the option to close an account without providing a rationale.”
It is worth noting that other AfD members have had their bank accounts closed as well. In 2020, the banking giant ING terminated the accounts of Thuringian AfD chief Björn Höcke and his wife. The bank’s termination letter, made public by Höcke, did not provide a specific reason but simply made a reference to the general terms and conditions.
Two years earlier, AfD MEP Nicolaus Fest’s bank account with Deutsche Bank was closed without prior notice. In comments given to Junge Freiheit about the affair, Fest said: “When I asked, I was simply told that nothing would be said.” When Junge Freiheit reached out to Deutsche Bank for comments the bank provided more or less the same response as ING and Postbank.
