AfD on migration and integration

The AfD wants foreign nationals to receive Bürgergeld (citizen's income) only after at least ten years of regular employment in Germany, and then for no more than one year. Refugees from Ukraine would again receive benefits at the level of asylum seekers.

The AfD wants to limit Bürgergeld for foreigners. They should first have worked in Germany for 10 years. Then they should get it for 1 year at most. Refugees from Ukraine should no longer get Bürgergeld. They should get the same as asylum seekers.

Eligibility would require at least ten years of employment in Germany with social insurance contributions and without any top-up welfare payments during that time. Foreigners could draw the benefit for a maximum of one year. Ukrainian war refugees would be moved out of Bürgergeld and treated like asylum seekers in terms of benefits, while keeping their right to work. Refugees who travel to their home country would lose their residence status.

The AfD wants Germany to stop taking part in the EU's common asylum policy, following Denmark's example. It considers the Common European Asylum System a failure. Decisions on immigration would be made at the national level alone.

The EU has shared rules for asylum. The AfD no longer wants to take part in them. Denmark already does it this way. Germany alone would decide who may come.

The platform argues that the basis of the European asylum rules has fallen away, so Germany is no longer bound by them. As reasons, it says that transfers under the Dublin rules mostly fail because of the responsible states and that the external borders are not secure. It adds that immigration since 2015 could not have been foreseen when the EU Treaty was ratified in 1993. The opt-out would cover asylum, subsidiary protection, and temporary protection. In the AfD's view, protecting public and internal security takes precedence over European asylum and immigration rules.

The AfD wants to control Germany's national borders again and turn back people without permission to enter. The Federal Police would serve as the border authority. In the platform's view, controls and refusals of entry are a self-evident right of sovereign states.

The AfD wants to control Germany's borders again. The Federal Police would do this job. People who are not allowed in would have to turn back at the border. Commuters, tourists, and goods would still cross the border.

Only people with permission would be allowed to enter; freedom of movement within the EU would remain in place. Detention centers are planned at the border to secure measures that end a person's stay. According to the platform, the controls would also help fight cross-border crime. Commuter, vacation, and goods traffic would continue. The platform points out that German law rules out entry to apply for asylum when someone arrives from a safe third country.

The AfD wants to replace the individual constitutional right to asylum with an institutional guarantee or an ordinary statute. It also wants to withdraw from the UN migration compact and the UN refugee compact and to initiate reforms of the Geneva Refugee Convention and the European Convention on Human Rights.

Today every persecuted person has their own right to asylum. The AfD wants to change that. Asylum would no longer be a personal basic right. The AfD also wants to quit two United Nations agreements. It wants to change other international treaties.

An institutional guarantee means the state upholds asylum as an institution, but an individual no longer has a claim that can be enforced in court. Only people facing immediate and concrete danger would still have a claim to be admitted for an asylum procedure. The AfD wants the two conventions adapted to the situation since 2015. The platform says it will observe rule-of-law standards in doing so.

The AfD wants asylum and protection applications to be filed and decided abroad in the future. It adds stricter requirements for applications, protection status, family reunification, and work. According to the platform, Germany has carried the heaviest burden of unauthorized immigration to Europe since 2015.

The AfD wants asylum claims to be checked outside Germany. Only people who prove who they are could apply. People who give false information would get no asylum. Stricter rules would also apply to family reunification and work.

Only people who prove their identity and nationality could apply; false statements about identity would end the right to asylum. The list of safe countries of origin would become considerably longer, and grounds for asylum would be reviewed every year. Protected persons who travel to their country of origin would lose their status and be barred from re-entering. The general entitlement to family reunification for people with subsidiary protection would be dropped. Asylum applicants and rejected applicants could work only in mandatory community-service placements. Visa procedures would become stricter, and state funding for organizations providing asylum procedure counseling would end.

The AfD rejects blanket quotas and distribution keys for immigrants at every level. The voluntary admission programs for Afghanistan and funding for civilian sea rescue in the Mediterranean would end.

The AfD wants no fixed numbers for taking in immigrants. It wants to stop the admission programs for Afghanistan. Private rescuers in the Mediterranean would get no more state money. Rescued people would be taken to North Africa.

People who, in the AfD's view, reach Europe by abusing sea rescue would not be admitted through a European distribution scheme. Citing the law of the sea, the platform demands that rescued people be brought ashore at the nearest port. Agreements with the Maghreb states would ensure that rescued people are taken there. The admission of Afghan local staff, which the platform calls a scandal, would be examined by a parliamentary committee of inquiry.

The AfD wants asylum seekers to stay in central reception facilities for the entire duration of their case. Court proceedings on asylum are to be sped up, and additional staff is to work through the backlog.

The AfD wants faster asylum cases. Asylum seekers should live in central facilities during that time. The courts should get more staff. This should clear old cases faster.

The platform calls for asylum seekers to live in central reception facilities until their case is decided. Proceedings before the administrative courts are to be shortened as far as the rule of law allows. To reduce the backlog of old cases, the AfD wants to add staff.

The AfD wants to reduce benefits for asylum seekers, which it considers too high by international comparison and an incentive to come to Germany. Benefits in kind are to take priority, with a payment card as the fallback. Recognized asylum seekers would also no longer get immediate access to all social benefits.

The AfD says asylum seekers get too much money. It believes this draws people to Germany. They should get goods instead of cash. Otherwise they get a payment card. Recognized refugees should not get all benefits right away either.

Benefits in kind are to be the rule; the payment card applies where in-kind benefits would be too burdensome to provide. People required to leave the country would receive only the minimum needed for a dignified existence. Recognition as entitled to asylum would no longer open immediate and unlimited access to all welfare benefits. Those who refuse a work opportunity would have their benefits cut. The platform justifies this with the burden on taxpayers and contributors and the recipients' lack of prior contributions.

The AfD wants to deport everyone who is required to leave the country and to scrap all rules that allow them to stay. In the platform's view, Duldung (temporary suspension of deportation) and new residence rights undermine the obligation to leave. Church asylum is also to be abolished.

The AfD wants to deport more people. This applies to everyone who must leave Germany. Special rules for staying should end. Church asylum should end too. That is when churches shelter people from deportation.

Among other things, the tolerated status for training and for employment and the Chancen-Aufenthaltsrecht (opportunity residence right) would be abolished; a certificate of the obligation to leave would replace the Duldung. Countries of origin that refuse to take back their citizens would face pressure through economic sanctions, suspended development aid and visa restrictions. Humanitarian residence permits would end once the reason for fleeing no longer exists. Foreign nationals classified as dangerous, extremists and serious criminals would be removed immediately to their home country or to third countries willing to take them. The platform also plans more detention places near borders and at airports, penalties for NGOs that obstruct deportations, termination of the church asylum agreement of the BAMF (migration office), and support for voluntary return.

The AfD wants to return Syrians who, in its view, are no longer entitled to protection to their home country. It cites a 2024 ruling by the Higher Administrative Court in Münster and the fall of the Assad regime. The same approach is later to apply to other countries of origin.

The AfD wants to send many Syrians back to Syria. It says civilians there no longer face danger from civil war. Protection for many Syrians should therefore end. The state should also promote voluntary return.

Criminal offenders, people classified as dangerous and all Syrians without continuing protection status would be returned first. The AfD wants to start revocation proceedings for Syrians holding subsidiary protection. Talks on returns are to be held with the Syrian government, both bilaterally and together with other EU states. Federal programs for voluntary return to Syria would be expanded and actively advertised. Once the conditions are met, the AfD wants to proceed the same way with people from other countries of origin.

The AfD demands that all migrants actively contribute to their own integration, above all through German skills at the B2 level and acceptance of the legal order. The country's capacity to integrate newcomers is to be restored by sharply limiting immigration.

The AfD wants migrants to do much for their own integration. They should learn German well, usually within 2 years. They should accept the rules in Germany. Anyone who drops a course should pay back the cost. Fewer new people should come to the country.

B2 language level is normally to be reached after two years, in exceptional cases after five. If an integration measure fails through the person's own fault, such as a dropped language course, the person would have to repay the cost. People without a right of residence are not to be integrated at any price; the platform wants to curb what it calls the "asylum industry." Welfare incentives the AfD considers misguided are to end. The platform justifies this with parallel societies and alienation in cities.

The AfD wants to go back to the citizenship law that applied until 1990. A person would then become German by descent from at least one German parent or through a discretionary decision by the authorities. The legal entitlement to naturalization and citizenship by birth in Germany would be abolished.

The AfD wants to make naturalization much harder. Children of foreigners should no longer become German by being born in Germany. Nobody should have a right to naturalization. The authorities should decide each case one by one. Naturalization should be possible after 10 years at the earliest.

Naturalization would be possible after ten years at the earliest and only with very good integration. Authorities would naturalize in individual cases only if the community gains a loyal new citizen. Multiple citizenships would again be ruled out because the AfD fears conflicts of loyalty; it allows exceptions mainly under EU law. The entitlement to naturalization after a longer period of residence would be eliminated.

The AfD wants to draw on domestic workers and bring back Germans who emigrated before admitting more skilled workers from outside Europe. After that, non-European workers would be selected according to need and strict criteria through a points system.

The AfD wants to find workers inside Germany first. German experts living abroad should come back. Only then should experts from outside Europe come. They would go through a points system. People with enough points may come.

The platform calls for programs to win back skilled workers who left and wants to stop workers and companies from leaving. A possible shortage of skilled labor should also be met with artificial intelligence, robotics, digitalization and higher productivity. Unskilled people already living legally in Germany should be trained first. For non-European skilled workers, a points system would apply with criteria such as work experience, a job contract and language skills, along with sectors and quotas set by need. The EU Blue Card would be developed further and aimed mainly at STEM experts and skilled tradespeople.