At the party conference of the AfD in Braunschweig, the AfD Federal Chairman Jörg Meuthen has rejected the allegation of personal misconduct in the donation scandal of his party. "I have not done anything indecent, wrong or illegal here," he responded to critical demands from delegates. He had never received or received any money.
In April, the Bundestag administration decided that the AfD must pay a total fine of 402,900 euros for illegal party donations. This involved help from the Swiss advertising agency Goal AG for Meuthen and the member of the executive board Guido Reil in state election campaigns in 2016 and 2017 (you can find out more about the background here).
The term party donation affair was wrong in two ways, Meuthen said. For one thing, it's not about party donations. And: "It is not an affair and it is not a scandal, but it is in itself a harmless process that is artificially inflated into something that it is not."
Meuthen had admitted that he had received in early 2016 in the state election campaign Baden-Württemberg from the Goal AG support services such as posters, flyers and ads with a value of 89,800 euros. The Bundestag administration regards these as illegal donations. She fixed a claim for payment amounting to three times the amount of donations improperly accepted.
New donation affair burdened AfD
That's why the AfD has gone to court. "I am absolutely sure that we will win this easily," Meuthen said in Braunschweig. According to the Federal Treasurer Klaus Fohrmann has the AfD since early 2018 for possible fines - also in other cases - reserves totaling one million euros formed.
Only one day before the beginning of the congress the SPIEGEL had reported on a new donation affair of the AfD. According to internal accounting documents, the AfD in 2013 and 2014 repeatedly violated the party law. It is about not properly declared and probably inadmissible donations totaling around 55,000 euros (read the full report).
Open is also a further penalty of 34,000 euros around the Kyffhäuser meeting of Right Wing Björn Höcke. Even co-faction leader in the Bundestag, Alice Weidel - she is running for the first proxy in the Federal Headquarters in Braunschweig - is still in the sights with the unclear donation scandal in her Lake Constance district association.
