When Elon Musk declared on X in 2024 that the AfD was the force that could “save Germany,” he aligned himself with a party that, as Bloomberg has noted, has shifted markedly to the far right since its 2013 founding. In February 2025 the AfD doubled its vote share to roughly 21% and became the main opposition in the 21st Bundestag. Chancellor Friedrich Merz, elected on 6 May 2025, and other mainstream leaders have kept the AfD at arm’s length, maintaining the informal Brandmauer (“firewall”) against coalition deals.
What the AfD stands for
Bloomberg’s explainer traces the AfD’s evolution from a euro-sceptic project, opposing EU bailouts and the single currency, into a party centred on hardline migration policy, including “remigration,” i.e., large-scale deportations. It also highlights the party’s Euroscepticism (from calls to quit the euro to talk of leaving the EU), a push to reopen ties with Russia and end military aid to Ukraine, and opposition to Germany’s renewables transition alongside support for reviving nuclear power, despite Germany closing its last reactors in April 2023. Co-leader Alice Weidel has attacked the EU’s 2035 phase-out of new combustion-engine cars as harmful to German industry.
Why, despite gains, the AfD still struggles for power
Germany’s parliament does not anoint a formal “government-in-waiting” opposition, and the AfD remains isolated from committee power-centres and high office in the Bundestag because other parties refuse cooperation. Even after its February breakthrough (about 152 seats in a 630-member chamber), that isolation persists, meaning it would need far higher support, or a breach of the Brandmauer, to enter national government.
Where its influence is felt
AfD popularity remains strongest in the east, but momentum is spilling west. In North Rhine-Westphalia local elections this weekend, the party nearly tripled its support, an outcome widely viewed as a warning for Merz’s coalition and a sign of deeper voter discontent on migration, security and industry.
Extremism designation and the “remigration” backlash
In May 2025, the domestic intelligence service (BfV) classified the AfD as a “confirmed right-wing extremist” organisation, then paused public use of the label days later pending a court ruling. The move followed months of protests sparked by Correctiv’s exposé of a 2023 meeting near Potsdam where “remigration” was discussed. Separately, courts fined Björn Höcke for using a banned Nazi slogan.
Controversies around leadership rhetoric
Weidel has rejected labels like “far right,” styling the party as “conservative” and “libertarian.” But she drew widespread condemnation in January 2025 after asserting in an X livestream with Elon Musk that “Hitler was a communist,” a claim debunked by historians and fact-checkers.
This article is based in part on Bloomberg’s reporting and analysis with additional context from Reuters, FT, AP and Correctiv
