Germany’s AfD leader has blasted politicians for ‘excluding millions of voters’ who want migration tackled in a heated TV debate last night amid claims of US election interference in favour of the hard right.
Alice Weidel, whose party has the support of top Washington adviser and tech billionaire Elon Musk, praised US Vice President JD Vance for his comments calling on Germany to drop its decades-long taboo of having the far right in government.
Vance insisted there was ‘no room for firewalls’.
While his comments had drawn criticism from other candidates, Weidel praised Vance for having ‘spoken out so clearly’ and said: ‘We must not build firewalls to exclude millions of voters from the outset – we have to talk to each other.’
Weidel – whose party is expected to come second in the election – also outlined last night how the AfD’s foreign policy agenda was similar to Donald Trump’s, further aligning her party with the US in terms of stopping the war in Ukraine.
US President Trump, who Weidel said was ‘exactly the right man’ for bring peace to Ukraine, has sidelined European leaders by calling his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin ahead of bilateral talks on Ukraine expected in the coming days.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Europe must be involved in any talks ‘because it cannot be done without us’. He added: ‘There will be no security guarantees that we have not developed ourselves and accept for ourselves.’
Trump’s special envoy to Ukraine, Keith Kellogg, has said Europe would not be directly involved in talks on Ukraine, though it would still have ‘input’. But Scholz said ‘no decisions will be made over its (Kyiv’s) head – we Europeans will not allow that’.
Germany’s AfD leader Alice Weidel (far right) has blasted politicians for ‘excluding millions of voters’ who want migration tackled in a heated TV debate last night amid claims of US election interference in favour of the hard right (also pictured left to right: Olaf Scholz, Friedrich Merz and Robert Habeck)
JD Vance (pictured) had called on Germany to drop its decades-long taboo of having the far right in government, insisting there was ‘no room for firewalls’
The campaign since has been dominated by a bitter debate on migration after a series of attacks blamed on asylum seekers. Most recently, a two-year-old girl and her mother were killed in a car-ramming attack in Munich last week that left 37 others wounded
Footage captured the moment the driver, Farhad N., (right) was arrested by police after he drove through the crowd
The election on Sunday is being held six months earlier than planned after Olaf Scholz’s centre-left coalition collapsed unable to agree on how to balance the budget.
The campaign since has been dominated by a bitter debate on migration after a series of attacks blamed on asylum seekers.
Most recently, a two-year-old girl and her mother were killed in a car-ramming attack in Munich last week that left 37 others wounded.
The perpetrator, a 24-year-old Afghan asylum seeker called Farhad N., drove a Mini Cooper into a crowd of around 1,000 striking unionists. Police revealed he has an ‘Islamist orientation’ and yelled ‘Allahu Akbar’ after the horrifying attack.
In January, two-year-old Yannis was stabbed to death by asylum seeker Enamullah O., 28, while he visited a park in Aschaffenburg, Bavaria, with his nursery group.
The Afghan asylum seeker, who was supposed to have left Germany, also killed a passerby and injured three others.
And just before Christmas, Saudi doctor Taleb al-Abdulmohsen, 50, rammed his SUV into a packed Christmas market in the town of Magdeburg, killing five women aged 45 to 75 and nine-year-old Andre Gleißner.
At least 299 people were injured, according to the interior ministry of the Saxony-Anhalt, with federal commissioner Roland Weber adding there were as many as 531 victims, including those who were traumatised after witnessing the horrifying attack.
The perpetrator, a 24-year-old Afghan asylum seeker called Farhad N. (pictured), drove a Mini Cooper into a crowd of around 1,000 striking unionists. Police revealed he has an ‘Islamist orientation’ and yelled ‘Allahu Akbar’ after the horrifying attack
In January, two-year-old Yannis (pictured) was stabbed to death by asylum seeker Enamullah O., 28, while he visited a park in Aschaffenburg, Bavaria, with his nursery group. The Afghan asylum seeker, who was supposed to have left Germany, also killed a passerby and injured three others
And just before Christmas, Taleb al-Abdulmohsen, 50, rammed his SUV (pictured) into a packed Christmas market in the town of Magdeburg, killing five women aged 45 to 75 and nine-year-old Andre Gleißner
Police arrested a 50-year-old Saudi doctor identified as Taleb al-Abdulmohsen (pictured) after he rammed his SUV into a packed market in the town of Magdeburg
Al-Abdulmohsen killed nine-year-old André Gleißner (pictured) in the ramming attack on the Christmas market
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A political earthquake will hit Germany next week: ROBERT HARDMAN beholds the AfD’s growing momentum
The anti-immigration AfD has seen its poll ratings edge upwards in recent months and is expected to register a record-breaking score of around 20 percent of the vote.
The conservative CDU-CSU alliance of former chancellor Angela Merkel is expected to be the biggest party after the election, with the AfD second.
The resurgence of the AfD – aided by US support, most notably from Musk – has alarmed its critics, with several demonstrations attracting large crowds in recent weeks.
Some 250,000 people attended a demonstration against the far right in Munich last weekend, with a similar demo in Berlin the week before drawing around 160,000.
Addressing migration during the debate last night, Scholz reiterated that Germany should ‘deport people on a large scale’, claiming: ‘We reduced irregular migration by 100,000 last year.’
Friedrich Merz, of the conversative CDU party, hit back: ‘As many new arrivals arrive in four days as are deported in a month.’
With more TV showdowns scheduled for the coming days, as well as public rallies, candidates are vying for every vote in the bitter campaign.
Around 30 percent of Germans are still undecided about who they want to vote for in the election, according to the latest surveys.
Viewers of Sunday’s debate put Merz ahead with 32 percent, while Scholz came second with 25 percent saying he was the most convincing candidate, according to a poll by the RTL broadcaster.
Weidel – the first AfD politician to feature in such a debate – found favour with 18 percent of viewers. She was tied with Robert Habeck of the Greens.
Addressing migration during the debate last night, Scholz (left) reiterated that Germany should ‘deport people on a large scale’, claiming: ‘We reduced irregular migration by 100,000 last year’
Tens of thousands protest recent advances made by the AFD on February 16, 2025 in Berlin
A demonstrator holds up a placard reading ‘FCK AfD’ (Alternative for Germany) during a protest against the far right, on February 16, 2025 in Berlin, Germany
Another protester carried a sign reading ‘No sex with nazis’ during last night’s demonstration in Berlin
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German chancellor Olaf Scholz hits out at JD Vance for ‘intervening’ in internal politics
Meanwhile, tens of thousands of demonstrators took to the streets of Berlin on Sunday night following Vance’s ‘firewall’ comments seemingly supporting the hard right.
Around 30,000 people took part in the protest, according to police, while organisers put the number at 38,000.
Many carried placards with slogans denouncing the AfD, which is expected to become the second-biggest party in next Sunday’s vote.
Robert Porth, 32, an employee at German rail operator Deutsche Bahn, said he was ‘really scared by the current political developments in Germany’.
‘I don’t want to have to reproach myself later that I sat at home on the sofa and did nothing about it while I still could,’ he said.
Pensioner Hannelore Reiner, 71, said she saw ‘a lot of parallels to 1933, to the time before the war when Hitler’s fascism came to power’.
‘A lot reminds me of that. The discussions back then, the exclusion, the anti-Semitism. And I’m afraid history will repeat itself,’ she said.
Scholz and Merz also criticised Vance’s comments at the debate, with the Chancellor calling them ‘unacceptable’ and asserting there is ‘no cooperation with the extreme right’.
‘I will not allow an American vice president to tell me who I can talk to here in Germany,’ said Friedrich Merz, who also told voters he would ‘not tolerate such interference’ in the February 23 polls or coalition negotiations.