For a Slovak reader who doesn't follow German politics day to day, it's worth explaining why such a sentence is a small bombshell in Germany. This is not ordinary coalition speculation. Albig has called into question an unwritten rule that has held German politics together for years.
What exactly Albig said
Albig based his proposal on two arguments. First, in his view, cooperation would bring a "disintegrating ferment" inside the AfD itself and break its unity. Second, minority governments tolerated from outside would be capable of governing, unlike fragile five-party coalitions. As a concrete example, he cited Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, where, he said, the state's premier Manuela Schwesig could, after the elections, declare that she is seeking a majority in the state parliament "issue by issue." Die Zeit ↗Albig stressed that cooperation does not mean identifying with the ideology of the right-wing populists. Rather, it is meant to be a signal to voters who have left social democracy. "In the Ruhr region, former comrades are joining the AfD one after another. And certainly not because they've all become Nazis, but because they don't find something with us," he said. He called on Chancellor Merz and SPD chairman Lars Klingbeil to prepare for such a scenario in the states. Tagesspiegel ↗
What the Brandmauer is and why cooperation with the AfD is taboo in Germany
The German term Brandmauer literally means "firewall". In politics, it denotes the norm among democratic parties, from conservatives to the left, that they should not enter coalitions with the AfD nor rely on its votes in governing. This barrier is more than a tactic. It has roots both in German postwar memory and in the AfD's radicalization after 2015.A murder gave it a concrete security dimension. On June 2, 2019, right-wing extremist Stephan Ernst shot Walter Lübcke, head of the Kassel government district for the conservative CDU, on the terrace of his own home. Lübcke had become a target for advocating the acceptance of refugees. The court sentenced Ernst to life imprisonment in January 2021. This murder is considered the first political assassination with a right-wing extremist motive in postwar Germany, and this case significantly strengthened the consensus on keeping the radical right out of power. Euronews ↗
Added to this is a formal assessment by the domestic counterintelligence agency. The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution classified the AfD on May 2, 2025, as "confirmed right-wing extremist." The party is contesting this in court, and in a preliminary procedural agreement the office committed not to publicly label it as such until a ruling on the AfD's motion. However, according to state authorities, some of the party's state organizations, for example in Brandenburg and Lower Saxony, carry the full designation. Legal Tribune Online ↗
Why the barrier is cracking right now
Albig's proposal did not arise in a vacuum. The AfD currently polls at twenty-seven to twenty-nine percent and in some polls is the strongest party in the country. Merz's Christian Democratic Union is holding around twenty-two percent, while Albig's SPD has fallen to twelve. Elections are being held in the autumn in Saxony-Anhalt, where the AfD is approaching the forty-percent mark, and in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. In both cases, there is a risk that a government cannot be formed without it. Wahlrecht.de ↗Bavarian premier Markus Söder of the CSU also admitted his own helplessness. The fight against the AfD is, in his words, "harder than we all thought." He had expected that Merz's stricter migration policy would weaken support for the right, but that did not happen. A commentator for the left-leaning newspaper taz compared the situation to a frog in a pot of slowly heating water, which notices the danger only when it is too late. taz ↗
The limits of Albig's recipe
Albig's voice needs to be put in context. He left active politics in 2017 after losing an election, and today he speaks not as an office-holder but as an elder statesman from the party's background. The current SPD leadership does not share his recipe. Even the Danish model he invokes is more complicated than it sounds. The Danish social democracy of Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen did adopt a tough migration policy, but it did not do so in alliance with the far right — on the contrary, it thereby marginalized it. And if the counterintelligence assessment remains in force, tolerating the AfD would represent a deep ethical contradiction for a party that grew out of the fight against fascism.This mechanism may be familiar to the Slovak reader. Political taboos rarely change all at once. They change through a series of exceptions that are initially described as technical or temporary, and Albig's case shows how such a shift begins. First, it is spoken aloud by someone who no longer has anything to lose.
