Special edition (political leaflet)

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Extrablatt is a political leaflet that has been distributed to private households in the run-up to state elections since 2016 and calls for the election of the Alternative for Germany party . The publisher is the association or the " Association for the Preservation of the Rule of Law and Civil Liberties ". According to information from the Swiss newspaper NZZ am Sonntag, the extra sheet was designed by PR specialist Alexander Segert based on the campaign sheet of the same name for the Swiss People's Party (SVP).

content

Baden-Württemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate

There were separate editions of the extra sheet for each of the two federal states. On the front page of the issue for Baden-Württemberg, people were asked to vote for the “political alternative”. The second page of the paper contained interviews with the respective state chairmen Jörg Meuthen and Uwe Junge . The interviews were followed by the call: "Vote AfD now."

The Frankfurter Rundschau described the content as “a lot of right-wing populist slogans, malice about the Chancellor and a horror scenario of 'crime, robbery, rape and sexual assault, drug trafficking, murder and manslaughter by offenders with a strange mentality'.” The Schwäbische Zeitung , the Badische Zeitung , the Neue Rottweiler Zeitung and the Freiburg Official Gazette issued statements that had nothing to do with the pamphlet.

Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Berlin

A ten-page "extra sheet" was produced for the elections and distributed to the households of the two federal states in August and September. The association also had large posters put up, on which a. meant: “More protection for family and property! Vote for AfD now "and" So that Germany is not destroyed! Now vote for AfD ”. The pamphlet contained criticism of refugee policy, of the EU and of Chancellor Angela Merkel . Advertisement was placed on YouTube with the slogan “We recommend: Vote AfD now”.

Saarland

In March 2017, before the state elections in Saarland 2017, an extra edition of 500,000 copies was distributed.

North Rhine-Westphalia

At the end of April 2017, before the state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia 2017, an extra edition of 2.6 million copies was distributed.

editor

Publisher of the pamphlets was the "Association for the preservation of the rule of law and civil liberties" and the existence since September 2016 Association for the preservation of the rule of law and civil liberties . Josef Konrad from Himmelkron acted as the spokesman for the campaign . Konrad also acts as managing director of Polifakt Medien GmbH, which is entered in the Leipzig commercial register . Both the company and the association were founded a few weeks before the state elections. The association operates its own website under the namerechtund Freiheit.de . The operator of the site is the publicist Michael Paulwitz . Several of the photos used in the pamphlets were purchased from the PR company Goal AG, Andelfingen , which also ran the club's poster campaigns. Konrad emphasized to the Stuttgarter Nachrichten that the actions of his association were activities of a group of politically independent citizens with the aim of informing the population about the problems and effects of the federal government's current immigration and euro policy. Konrad told the Handelsblatt that the campaign had been financed from a large number of "larger and smaller donations". According to research from the world , there should be a group of twelve anonymous major donors. According to club chairman David Bendels , parties and candidates with a conservative profile will be supported in the upcoming state election campaigns and before the federal election. The association currently sees the AfD as the only truly bourgeois-conservative force.

Connection to the party Alternative for Germany

Jörg Meuthen told the German Press Agency that neither the AfD nor he had anything to do with the action. The AfD regional associations of Rhineland-Palatinate and Saxony-Anhalt also denied having anything to do with the action. Josef Konrad, the spokesman for the association for the "preservation of the rule of law and civil liberties", stressed to the Stuttgarter Nachrichten that the actions were "in no way coordinated with the AfD or any other party".

Annette Sawatzki from Lobbycontrol considered it possible that the transparency regulations of the party law were deliberately circumvented. The AfD is moving in a legal gray area. The party lawyer Sophie Lenski considered the suspicion of a disguised donation to be very obvious. The Bundestag administration initiated an investigation into the suspicion of illegal party donation , but found no relevant clues.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ The AfD receives support from Switzerland , nzzas.nzz.ch, July 1, 2017
  2. ^ Karl Doemens: AfD under pressure because of anonymous donation. In: Frankfurter Rundschau , March 8, 2016.
  3. ↑ Christoph Plate: "Extrablatt" is not from Schwäbischer Zeitung . In: Schwäbische.de . ( schwaebische.de [accessed on December 22, 2016]).
  4. ↑ Bayreuther is behind AfD “Extrablatt”. In: Nordbayerischer Kurier . Retrieved May 12, 2016 .
  5. ↑ Swiss "Weltwoche" examines legal steps against "Extrablatt" . ( tagesspiegel.de [accessed December 22, 2016]).
  6. ↑ a b Friederike Haupt: The secret helpers of the AfD. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung . August 21, 2016. Retrieved August 25, 2016 .
  7. ↑ Secret donors in DER SPIEGEL 12/2017, p. 33.
  8. ^ Right-wing populist association advertises the AfD with free newspapers , wdr.de, May 2, 2017
  9. ↑ a b c Discrete AfD patrons remain generous. In: Focus Online . December 17, 2016, accessed December 22, 2016 .
  10. ↑ Bayreuther is behind AfD “Extrablatt”. In: Nordbayerischer Kurier . Retrieved May 12, 2016 .
  11. ↑ a b Election campaign donations for AfD apparently flowed indirectly. In: MDR . Retrieved May 12, 2016 .
  12. ↑ Sven Röbel: AfD wants to raise the mood against Angela Merkel after terrorist attacks. ( Memento of the original from September 17, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: GMX , September 17, 2016. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.gmx.net
  13. ↑ a b Millions of advertising for the AfD. In: Stuttgarter Nachrichten . Retrieved May 12, 2016 .
  14. ↑ Who finances the inflammatory AfD leaflets? In: The world . Retrieved May 12, 2016 .
  15. ↑ a b Hetz flyers stir up suspicions of illegal party donations. In: Spiegel Online . Retrieved May 12, 2016 .
  16. ↑ a b AfD on suspicion of illegal party donation. In: Allgemeine Zeitung . Retrieved May 12, 2016 .