The Hessian AfD loses one of its founding members - Rainer Rahn. The parliamentary group had already wanted to get rid of this two years ago. Now he goes himself With rumbling criticism. Another AfDler resigns and describes the faction as a "supply institution" for people who are unfit for work.
Two prominent members of the AfD Hessen have left the state parliamentary group and the party. In a statement, the top candidate for the 2018 state elections, Rainer Rahn, accused the faction of having an “anti-democratic spirit”. His party has turned away from fact-based and objective politics. Rahn is one of the founding members of the Hessian state association. Deputy Walter Wissensbach also declared his resignation. In a statement, the AfD faction attributed the resignations to “personal disappointment”.
Rahn and Wissenbach combined their statements with sharp criticism of the course of the AfD and the work of the parliamentary group. This is characterized by "technical incompetence," wrote the 70-year-old Rahn. Rahn had previously accused the parliamentary group leader of "Stasi methods". In May 2020, the parliamentary group announced that they had become increasingly "alienated" from Rahn. However, a vote on excluding Rahn from the parliamentary group failed to get a majority.
Only a few hours before Rahn, the MP Wissensbach had announced his resignation. He accused the parliamentary group of having "developed into a pension facility for people who are in financial difficulties and unfit for normal employment outside the party". He also criticized his party's pro-Russia stance. The tone within the group was difficult to bear, he explained.
Knowledge Bach caused a stir in the course of a lawsuit. In an internal email, he described a colleague in the parliamentary group as a "proud member of the Identitarian Movement". The district court in Frankfurt am Main dismissed an action for injunctive relief against Wissenbach. The competent civil chamber decided that the statement was a "permissible expression of opinion".
With the two exits, the parliamentary group is now shrinking to 15 members. In the 2018 state elections, the Alternative received 19 mandates, 18 of which were subsequently accepted into the parliamentary group.
The AfD parliamentary group countered the allegations on Friday by saying that the two who left the party "set their own priorities independently of the parliamentary group". Both Rahn and Wissenbach ran unsuccessfully in October when the list was drawn up for the state elections in autumn 2023. The parliamentary group accused them of the fact that the resignations were "an expression of their personal disappointment" about the lost votes. Her allegations did not reflect reality.
