Young right-wing politician convicted on shocking grounds

The German lawmaker will challenge the court's decision in the second instance.

WORLD POLITICS MAY 11. 2024 17:00

Marie-Therese Kaiser, a politician from the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, was recently convicted for publishing statistics on gang rape in response to news that Afghan migrants would be moved to her district.

The 27-year-old politician has been found guilty in the Verden regional court in Lower Saxony this week for „inciting hatred” against local Afghan workers. She has been ordered to pay a fine of €6,000, being charged €60 a day for 100 days. She will also have a criminal record. Several caricatures about the case have been posted on the internet.

The case goes back to a post shared on social media in August 2021, in which she criticised Hamburg’s social democratic administration for inviting migrants to the city, despite crime statistics. The politician shared an article, revealing that Germany has seen a sharp increase in gang rape cases since the 2015 migrant crisis, with Afghan migrants being largely the perpetrators. In 2021, Kaiser criticised Hamburg Mayor Peter Tschentscher’s decision after he announced the arrival of two hundred Afghan workers in Hamburg. Kaiser protested against this move with the statistics, saying she was concerned about the consequences of immigration. In a video message on her social media site, Marie-Therese Kaiser said that she would challenge the decision in court again, despite the conviction in the second instance, as she had merely published official state statistics.

The case of the young right-wing politician has drawn so much attention that even Elon Musk has taken notice. The billionaire businessman reacted on his social media page, finding it hard to believe that someone could be convicted for publishing official government statistics.

WORLD POLITICS

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germany, justice, migrant