Germany’s top court on Tuesday stripped a neo-Nazi party of the right to public financing and the tax advantages normally extended to political organizations, a decision that could provide a blueprint for government efforts to head off a resurgence of the far right.
Although the party, Die Heimat, which means the Homeland, was already too small to receive public funding, the case was closely watched because it could have implications for countering the Alternative for Germany, or AfD, a far more popular far-right party. In recent months, scholars and politicians have argued that the AfD should be banned on the basis that the party represents a threat to democracy.
“Today’s decision by the Federal Constitutional Court sends out a clear signal: Our democratic state does not fund enemies of the Constitution,” Nancy Faeser, Germany’s interior minister, said in a statement.
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