In early 2024, Marine Le Pen decided to cut cooperation with the extremist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party because of some political actions of the latter that threatened to compromise her ambition to become President of France. The “divorce” led Germans to create a new group at the European Parliament, as they were rejected by Le Pen’s new group, Patriots for Europe (PfE). However, this period of isolating the dangerous AfD is terminating, as recent mobility within the far-right milieu indicates.
The risky for Le Pen “remigration” project
In January 2024, relations between Marine Le Pen and AfD entered a critical phase following the release of a video revealing a secret meeting in Potsdam. This meeting proposed transferring numerous “unassimilated German citizens” of foreign origin to North Africa. Le Pen expressed her outrage and threatened to dissolve the Identity and Democracy (ID) group in the European Parliament. Despite German security authorities meticulously scrutinising the AfD, Le Pen was determined to maintain ID unity ahead of the European elections.
In 2027, Le Pen plans to run for the French presidential election for the fourth time. She tries to reshape her political profile by distancing herself from the most extremist elements. However, she is awaiting a verdict from the criminal court in Paris on 31 March, which may make her ineligible to compete in elections.
News of Le Pen’s reaction in January 2024 alarmed many within AfD leadership. The French National Rally (RN) was AfD’s most significant and powerful ally in the European Parliament and the EU. On 20 February 2024, Alice Weidel, co-chair of the AfD, travelled to Paris for a meeting with Marine Le Pen, the parliamentary group leader of RN, and the party’s new leader, Jordan Bardella. The purpose was to discuss the AfD’s perspective on the secret Potsdam meeting.
The two sides met at a restaurant rather than at the RN party headquarters, and the specifics of their conversation remain undisclosed. Only Weidel publicly shared her enthusiasm regarding the meeting, while the RN leadership chose not to comment.
Le Pen ends Identity and Democracy group
The German Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) has classified the AfD as a potentially extreme party since 2021. In May 2024, a German high court ruled that BfV was justified in monitoring the party for suspected extremism and that it “could continue to be treated as a potentially extremist party”. April 2024, prosecutors charged Björn Höcke, the Chief of the AfD parliamentary group in the state parliament of Thuringia and the leader of an internal extremist faction of the party (Der Flügel), with a second count of uttering a slogan used by the Nazis’ SA stormtroopers at a political event. AfD is also facing allegations of hosting Chinese and Russian spies and agents.
In May 2024, AfD leading election candidate Maximilian Krah said in an interview that “SS were not all criminals”. Consequently, the French far-right leader said that RN needed to make a “clean break” with the AfD party. In a radio interview, Le Pen noted that the AfD had become too toxic, rudderless, and in hock to radical elements within it. “The AfD goes from provocation to provocation,” she said.
Thus, on 23 May 2024, “the Bureau of the Identity and Democracy Group in the European Parliament decided to exclude the German delegation, AfD, with immediate effect.”
Le Pen created a new group, practically renaming the ID group into the Patriots for Europe (PfE), with the addition of the Hungarian Fidesz of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, the ANO of former Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babiš and Spanish VOX, which defected from the ECR Group. AfD tried again to enter PfE, but Le Pen firmly rejected it. Consequently, AfD established a new group at the European Parliament, the Europe of Sovereign Nations (ESN), partnering with the most extremist parties of the Parliament. Blind Russophilia characterises both PfE and ESN.
Has Le Pen abandoned the anti-Remigration stance?
However, PfE and ESN groups seem to be trying to establish cooperation despite PfE’s formal opposition to AfD’s racism. Three recent events indicate a tendency to seek rapprochement between the two groups. Especially now that Germany is expected to play a leading role on the European level, the two far-right parties of France and Germany understand how important it is to coordinate their actions.
Firstly, AfD co-chair Alice Weidel (ESN) asked for a meeting with Orbán. The two met in Budapest on 12 February. However, the purpose of this meeting remains unclear. It may be the start of potential cooperation between the AfD and the parties of the PfE. Moreover, Weidel, when in Budapest, avoided a meeting with ESN member and AfD sister party Our Homeland Movement (Mi Hazánk Mozgalom), an extremist party opposing Orbán’s government with arguments from conspiracy theories and the antisemitic and racist arsenal. Interestingly, in a joint press conference with Weidel, Orbán mentioned that many points in the AfD’s platform align with Hungary’s interests, particularly regarding migration and energy policy. Both criticised the EU and expressed support for Russian views on the Ukraine war.
Then, on 13 February, the extremist ESN group organised a conference at the European Parliament promoting the “remigration” project of the AfD. Interestingly, the conference was broadly supported by the PfE group of Marine Le Pen. Hermann Tertsch, an MEP elected with the Spanish VOX and vice-president of PfE, participated in the three-member panel. During the protest, MEPs from Le Pen’s party, Rassemblement National, were seen yelling profanities at the demonstrators before leaving the scene. Was Tertsch’s participation another signal that Le Pen’s group flirts with the AfD?
Lastly, on 22 February, Bulgaria’s far-right Revival party incited protesters to attack the EU mission building in Sofia during a demonstration against the country’s plans to join the eurozone. This situation is particularly alarming given that the Revival party holds three seats in the European Parliament in the ranks of ESN. Additionally, PfE vice president Tertsch quickly expressed support for the attackers. Tertsch once more tried to bridge deferences between Le Pen’s group and the ESN.
Practically supporting the way the Revival’s extremists expressed their outrage at the replacement of the Bulgarian Lev with the Euro, Tertsch replied to von der Leyen’s declaration with a shameful post on X:
“No message for the victims of the murderers among illegal immigrants that YOU, with your party and socialists and communists, promote. No moral outrage for the killings provoked by your anti-national open borders policy. But very angry because some Bulgarians have smeared some paint in the EU woke embassy.”
Was Le Pen aware of such emerging cooperation? Does the French far-right leader abandon her condemnation of AfD’s remigration proposal? Or is Le Pen who tries to bring the two groups closer?
