AfD Reelects Weidel as 30,000 Protesters Clash With Police in Erfurt
A Thuringian court overturned a ban on the far-right party's congress just hours before it opened, as tens of thousands flooded the city trying to shut it down.
Tens of thousands of demonstrators flooded the eastern German city of Erfurt on Saturday, clashing with riot police as they tried to shut down the national congress of the far-right Alternative for Germany party. Inside the heavily guarded hall, delegates pressed ahead anyway, overwhelmingly reelecting the AfD's leadership and underscoring the party's rise as one of the most powerful forces in German politics.
Alice Weidel, the party's chancellor candidate and public face, was returned as co-leader with 81 percent of the delegates' vote, while co-chair Tino Chrupalla was reelected with 70 percent. The votes cemented a leadership team that has steered the AfD to the top tier of national polls, even as Germany's domestic intelligence service and mainstream parties treat the group as a threat to the country's democratic order.
Outside, police estimated that more than 30,000 protesters occupied public squares, blocked major roads and disrupted public transit in an effort to prevent delegates from reaching the venue. Officers in riot gear deployed batons and used escort convoys to move AfD buses into the city center. Authorities described the demonstrations as "mostly peaceful," recording roughly 100 law violations, mainly graffiti, though scattered scuffles broke out through the day.
The congress had been thrown into doubt hours earlier when a Thuringian court overturned a local ban on the gathering, ruling that authorities could not prohibit a lawful party from meeting. The decision forced officials to abandon their prohibition and pivot to a high-security operation, shielding delegates from the crowds massed in the streets.
The gathering carried a heavy symbolic charge: it coincided with the 100th anniversary of a 1926 Nazi Party meeting held nearby that helped Adolf Hitler consolidate control over the fascist movement, a parallel protesters seized upon in their banners and chants. The AfD, which finished second in Germany's most recent federal election, has been formally classified as a suspected extremist organization by parts of the German security establishment — a label the party rejects as politically motivated. Saturday's scenes in Erfurt captured the deepening confrontation between a surging nationalist party and the broad coalition of Germans determined to stop it.
Originally reported by PBS NewsHour.