The regional leader of the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) party in the German state of Thuringia, Björn Höcke, has been convicted and fined again for using a banned Nazi slogan.
Höcke, 52, was found guilty of using signals from unconstitutional and terrorist organizations to lead a crowd in chanting the banned motto of the Nazi SA troopers – “Alles für Deutschland” (Everything for Germany) – during a speech at a celebration event December 2023.
Höcke said the first two words and then reportedly gestured to the crowd to finish the slogan. At the time, he was under criminal charges for using the same banned slogan during a separate speech at an election campaign event in May 2021.
Chairman Jan Stengel said Höcke’s guilt in the case was indisputable and that he knew he was committing a criminal offence by uttering the slogan.
Stengel said the politician clearly wanted the crowd to finish the slogan and was deliberately testing the boundaries of what could be said.
Stengel rejected Höcke’s claims that he was the victim of political persecution. The judge noted that he has reviewed convictions from courts in the now-defunct communist East Germany over the past 30 years and is familiar with cases of genuine political persecution.
During his plea on Monday, Höcke claimed that his opponents were using the judge to “silence” him.
In May, Höcke was sentenced to a €13,000 ($14,000) fine in that earlier case. He is currently appealing the verdict.
The court in Halle sentenced Höcke on Tuesday to a fine of a total of €16,900.
Prosecutor Benedikt Bernzen had asked the court for an eight-month suspended prison sentence and an order banning Höcke from holding political office for two years, while Höcke’s defense demanded an acquittal.
“The fine is sufficient,” Stengel said in rejecting those requests.
The verdict is not yet legally binding. His lawyers said they would decide in the coming days whether to appeal.
Höcke is the party leader for the AfD in the upcoming state elections in Thuringia. The party is clearly in the lead in the polls.
He also still faces another ongoing criminal case on charges of incitement of the people over a message Höcke posted in Telegram in 2022 after an act of violence in the city of Ludwigshafen.
In the message, Höcke suggested that there is a “widespread disease among immigrants that causes victims to shout ‘Allahu Akbar’ and distorts their perception so that they see the ‘disbelieving’ hosts as people unworthy of life.”
The hearing dates have not yet been determined in that case.
