Germany: Who are the AfD’s immigrant voters?

The alternative for Germany (FCA) obviously defines its perspectives on immigrants in its program: “FCA sees the ideology of multiculturalism as a serious risk for social peace and continuous lifestyles of the country as a cultural entity. “

And yet, multiculturalism seems to be a serious risk for FCA itself: in recent months, more and more extreme right messages have addressed the electorate in the many immigrants of Germany, with some success.

Born in Turkey, ISMET VAR, 55, has lived in Germany since childhood, has been a German citizen since 1994, and defender of the excessive election of the right for Germany (AFD) since its base in 2013.

VAR paintings as a motor delivery force in the German capital, and their paintings were directly affected by the accumulation of fuel costs after the large -scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. Now, you cannot understand why you “Tira” so much money in financial and military aid for Ukraine. His greatest concern, he says, is that taxes are lowered and that corrupt immigrants are expelled.

The latter is already: the most recent statistics show that the Center’s leftist government Olaf Scholz has greater deportations during the year. “Now! They are exulting people!” Var said in a coffee in the Kreuzberg International District in Berlin. “But they didn’t. ” He believes that he took the intervention of the AFD in the German political scene so that the government acts.

As an Alevite, he also believes that Germany has too tolerant of what he calls “strict Muslims. “” I have not anything opposed to them when they pray at home, yet when they do propaganda, then I am opposed to them,” he said.

Var experienced racism as a new arrival in Germany in the 1970s: He remembers a janitor in his building telling him that he and his family wouldn’t be there if Hitler were still in power: “But it didn’t bother me. I was little,” he says.

Anna Nguyen has also experienced a lot of racism in Germany. Born near Kassel in 1990 of Vietnamese refugees, she is now a representative of AFD in the Parliament of the state of Hesse. But, he insists, they are not the Racist Germans towards her, they are basically other people who think about being Arabs.

“During COVID, it was always people with an immigrant background, presumably Arabs, who shouted ‘corona, corona’ after me and my Chinese friend,” she said. “It’s true that on the internet I get flooded with racist comments — but from the left, even though they call themselves anti-racists.”

Nguyen insists that her party, on the other hand, is separating itself from the race and not strategically seeking electorates like her. “This is not the background of immigrants,” he said. This is the fact that all other practical people for this country need to save this green ideological madness. It is: can I have an intelligent life? Is it safe? Do we have a certain supply of electrical energy?””

Voters with an immigrant background are a demographic reality in Germany: Official statistics from 2023 show that some 12% of the German electorate have a non-German background — some 7.1 million people. As recently as 2016, some 40% of voters of migrant background voted for the center-left Social Democrats (SPD), and another 28% for the center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU). But those loyalties appear to have eroded.

According to the German Integration and Migration Research Center (Dezim), which publishes an exam on the vote habit between migrants at the end of January, there is little difference between the habit of voting with or without delighting in immigrationarry until the end of the general The elections in 2017, 35% of the German Turks voted for the SPD, while 0% voted for AFD. Now, according to Dezim, the immigrants electorate is not more or less voted than non -migrant Germans.

Dezim’s Jannes Jacobsen, who co-wrote the upcoming report, said the AfD is more horny for other people from other backgrounds. He also pointed out that these electorates are German citizens, and they themselves are Germans. “So, it arguably wouldn’t be a great wonder if those other people didn’t vote in a very alternative way for other people who don’t have an immigrant background,” he told DW.

In 2023, Robert Lambrou, also an AfD state parliamentarian in Hesse, founded an organization named “With Migration Background for Germany” for immigrant AfD supporters. The organization’s website says it has 137 members from over 30 countries, and that it is open to anyone “who professes their belief in German culture as the dominant culture and work for the continued existence of the nation as a cultural entity.”

“My AfD delights in the fact that it doesn’t make a difference whether you are an immigrant or not by origin,” Lambrou, 55, whose Greek father, told DW. “I don’t see the party as xenophobic, we need a practical migration policy. “

But it is difficult to face statements such as that of the AFD Bundestag member, René Springer, who, after the revelations at the beginning of last year in X: “We will send foreigners to their countries in the house. By one million. This is A secret plan is a promise. “

Lambrou has agreed that confident statements are not useful if they are not well grounded in facts or explicit nuances. “When we become aware of the statements of party members that we don’t think we’re okay, then we check to look for the internal discussion of the party,” he said.

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However, to have more and more Videos of Tiktok Pro-FD made through non-white in recent months.

Özgür Özvatan, CEO of political consultancy Transformer, and author of a forthcoming book on the political impact of Germans with an immigrant background, said the AFD has been actively targeting the immigrant electorate for at least the past year, particularly other people. Russian and Turkish roots, basically because those communities are more likely to have voting rights. According to Germany’s official statistics, there are more than 2. 9 million other people of Turkish origin in Germany, of whom approximately 1. 6 million have German citizenship. The post-Soviet diaspora, on the other hand, is also opposed by millions and includes various nationalities and ethnic teams, adding German. They are also likely to be attracted to AFD’s pro-Russian position in the Ukraine War.

Özvatan argues that all this is a component of AFD’s broader strategy to make its voter base larger. “His possible electorate in the non -immigrant landscape, of course, are finished,” he said. “They would possibly have a possible vote of around 20 to 25% there, however, if they need to succeed in 30 to 35%, then they will have to enlarge their portfolio, which will mean creating promising content and policies for immigrants from communities .

“People who emigrated previously are not in favor of immigration,” Özvatan told DW. “They can be immigrants and occupy anti -immigrant positions. “

Nguyen insists that the immigrants electorate does not deter through racism and contradictions “because they know who is destined through this, it is illegal immigrants, in the specific ones since 2015. These are criminals, and other people in terms of immigration suffers so much that anyone.

Özvatan thinks many immigrant voters simply aren’t aware of the racist statements, and even when they do hear overt racism, they quickly dismiss it as secondary to their main perception of the AfD — that they don’t mean them. “The main feeling is, ‘they are friendly towards us,'” he said, “And the AfD tries to engender that feeling.”

Edited through Rina Goldenberg

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