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Tens of thousands protest as AfD opens Erfurt conference under heavy police protection
Tens of thousands protest as AfD opens Erfurt party conference under heavy police escort
Tens of thousands of protesters flooded central Erfurt on Saturday as the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) opened its federal party conference under heavy police protection, in a dramatic showdown between political opponents that underscored the party’s growing influence ahead of autumn state elections.
The two-day congress in the Thuringian capital began on schedule despite multiple blockades across the city, including a seven-strong network of sit-down protests that shut down key routes into Erfurt. Police confirmed at least seven major blockades, with demonstrators occupying central squares and a section of the A4 Autobahn. Authorities reported that 540 of the 600 registered AfD delegates had already arrived by mid-morning, many escorted through remaining open corridors by police.
Protesters, led by the alliance “Widersetzen” (“Resistance”), chanted slogans such as “Nazis raus, Nazis raus” as they marched toward the Messe Erfurt convention center where the conference is being held. “It’s important to send a signal against the shift to the right,” said 19-year-old demonstrator Lene Krug from nearby Gera. “The AfD is an anti-democratic party that spreads hate.”
Inside the hall, AfD co-leader Alice Weidel struck a defiant tone, declaring the party the “new people’s party” of Germany and vowing that opponents would not “break us.” Addressing delegates draped in black-red-gold flags, she claimed the AfD now has 75,000 members—up from 50,000 at the end of 2024—and predicted it would soon surpass 100,000. “You will not break us,” she said to cheers. “Quite the opposite—we will become ever stronger and bigger.”
Weidel also accused mainstream parties of waging a campaign of “hatred and incitement” against the AfD, singling out the CDU as pursuing policies “against the Germans, against Germany, against the interests of our country.” She dismissed the SPD as a once-proud workers’ party now “fading silently from German political history.”
Thuringia’s AfD leader Björn Höcke, whose state branch is classified by domestic intelligence as “provenly right-wing extremist,” struck a similarly combative note. He hailed the “firewall” strategy against the AfD as a failure that had only strengthened the party, predicting the first AfD state premiers would soon take office in the east. Höcke also threatened to withdraw public funding from civil society groups he accused of promoting a “multi-colored civil society” at odds with “national identity.”
Police reported isolated clashes, including an attack on two journalists from the right-wing online portal Apollo News in Erfurt’s Friedensstraße, which prompted the use of batons and pepper spray. Authorities said an AfD constituency office was also targeted with paint bombs and fireworks.
The protests come ahead of state elections in Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg-West Pomerania in September, where polls currently place the AfD in first or second place. In Berlin, the party ranks third in surveys, ahead of the governing CDU. AfD co-leader Tino Chrupalla told delegates, “You are our hope this year,” and suggested the party might soon govern alone in some eastern states.
Despite the scale of opposition, the AfD’s congress proceeded as planned, with police reporting up to 20,000 demonstrators in the streets and preparing for potential violence from a minority of “left-wing extremists.”
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