AfD on migration and integration

The AfD wants to restore a clear line between labor immigration and asylum and to gear immigration to the country's own needs. Illegal migration is to be stopped, and everyone required to leave should leave.

The AfD wants to separate asylum from immigration for work. Germany should decide for itself who may come. People who must leave should leave. Well-trained immigrants are welcome.

In the AfD's view, other parties have deliberately blurred the difference between labor immigration and asylum. The party rejects the "Spurwechsel" (lane change), meaning rejected asylum seekers switching to a work-based residence status, as well as repeatedly renewed toleration permits. The platform says qualified immigrants are welcome. Anyone seeking citizenship should adopt the country's language and culture.

The AfD demands that NRW press the federal government for more Federal Police along the border with the Netherlands and Belgium. Unauthorized persons would be turned back at Germany's borders without exception.

The AfD wants more Federal Police at the border in the west of NRW. People who may not enter should be turned back there. This should apply with no exceptions. NRW should demand this from the federal government.

According to the platform, the border with the two neighboring countries is 494 kilometers long and can be crossed at about 400 points. The AfD describes it as a hot spot for illegal immigration and cross-border crime. As an example, it cites gangs that blow up ATMs.

The AfD wants to give asylum seekers in-kind benefits instead of cash and pay any remaining cash benefits only via chip cards. Regular work or vocational training would be barred during the asylum procedure and once someone is required to leave. The party says this would remove incentives for migration into the welfare system.

Asylum seekers should get goods instead of money. Any money left should come only on a chip card. They should not be allowed to work during their case. The AfD wants fewer people to come this way.

The platform sees social and health benefits as a pull factor and social spending as the biggest burden on municipalities and the state. Abuse is to be prevented through strict checks and penalties. The party justifies the ban on work and training by saying it would otherwise entrench people's stay. It also wants tighter national border security and to turn asylum seekers back there. At the federal level it wants to change what it sees as an unfair equal treatment of newcomers and long-term residents in social benefits.

The AfD wants mandatory medical age assessments for unaccompanied foreign minors whenever their age is in doubt. Their families would be barred from joining them, and at 18 they would move into the asylum procedure without exception.

Some young foreigners arrive without parents. The AfD wants doctors to check their age when there is doubt. Their families should not be allowed to follow. At 18 they should enter the asylum process.

The platform cites average costs of 60,000 to 80,000 euros per person per year and calls them disproportionate. It says that in nine out of ten cases minority cannot be reliably proven for lack of identity papers. The party points to studies from Sweden suggesting many supposed youths are already adults. It also argues the young people are often sent ahead so their families can follow later.

The AfD opposes municipalities or the state voluntarily taking in additional migrants. It considers aid in countries of origin or in safe neighboring states far more effective.

Some cities want to take in more migrants by choice. The AfD is against this. It prefers to help in the home countries. It says this helps more people.

In the party's view, help on the ground would also prevent deaths in the Mediterranean. It opposes shifting responsibility for admission from the federal level to states or municipalities. It regards municipal "safe harbor" declarations as legally ineffective because cities lack the authority.

The AfD wants those legally allowed to stay to enter the labor market faster and to be placed immediately in mandatory integration measures. Integration projects would be critically monitored and evaluated for success.

People who may stay should find work quickly. They must take courses right away. There they learn German and the country's values. The AfD wants to check whether integration projects really work.

The measures include instruction in civics as well as combined courses teaching language and values. The party also considers language and values important for people with only temporary protection. It justifies the evaluations by saying public funds should not be misused by what it calls the asylum industry.

The AfD wants to eliminate options that, in its view, let rejected asylum seekers prolong their stay. The hardship commission would be abolished, the church asylum agreement terminated, and refugee counseling shifted from independent organizations to state agencies.

The AfD wants to abolish the hardship commission. This body can let rejected people stay. Church asylum should end too. Only the state should advise refugees.

The platform speaks of about 75,000 people in the state who are required to leave but can stay legally thanks to numerous loopholes. Cooperation in refugee counseling with independent providers, NGOs and especially the Flüchtlingsrat NRW (refugee council) would end, with immigration offices taking over. The party says the hardship commission is used to bridge time until an employment-based toleration permit is granted. It wants the agreement between the federal migration office BAMF and the churches terminated at the federal level, arguing church asylum is not a recognized legal institution.

The AfD wants to deport significantly more people and curb Duldung (toleration) permits. To that end, the list of safe countries of origin would be expanded, the central immigration offices strengthened, and toleration permits for training and employment abolished.

The AfD wants to deport more people. Those who must leave should go or be taken back. More countries should count as safe. The offices for deportations should get more staff.

Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria and Georgia, among others, would be classed as safe countries of origin. Decisions on toleration and deportation would move from municipal offices to the central immigration offices at district government level, which along with return coordination units would get more staff; police deportation units would also grow. Through a Bundesrat initiative the party wants to scrap toleration permits for training and employment and end so-called chains of toleration. Protection from expulsion for offenders would drop to the minimum under European and international law for serious and antisemitic crimes. Countries that do not cooperate in identifying their nationals would face pressure via development aid, visas and, if needed, sanctions; people who leak deportation dates would be prosecuted.

The AfD wants to replace state programs that integrate people required to leave into the labor market with a return program called "Fit4Return." It would train people in occupations needed to rebuild their home countries.

Some people have to leave Germany. The AfD wants to prepare them for going back. They should learn jobs their home country needs. The program is called Fit4Return.

The program targets people from countries that went through war or civil war and are now being rebuilt. Subsidies for return projects would be increased. The party sees this as a gain for returnees and their home countries, since they would take along job skills acquired in Germany.

The AfD opposes making dual or multiple citizenship the standard case. Anyone becoming German should, as a rule, continue to give up their previous citizenship so that, in the party's view, no conflicts of loyalty arise.

People who become German should give up their old passport. That should stay the rule. The AfD is against two passports as the normal case. It says loyalty would otherwise be unclear.

The party sees naturalization as a possible conclusion of successful integration. Citizenship should not go to people who break the law or do not clearly commit to Germany. It would leave in place the exceptions already provided for in the citizenship law.

The AfD wants to abolish the municipal integration councils and the state integration council and replace them with a different body. It cites low voter turnout and what it sees as growing influence of extremist groups.

Cities have integration councils. Elected people there speak for immigrants. The AfD wants to abolish these councils. A new body should replace them.

The platform points to the 2020 election with a turnout of 13.3 percent and sees a legitimacy problem. It speaks of influence by Turkish fundamentalists such as the Grey Wolves and of infiltration attempts by Islamist organizations. Many eligible voters are already integrated or naturalized, so the party says the councils contribute nothing to integration. Where anti-constitutional activity by council representatives is found, that council would be dissolved.

The AfD wants to limit immigration to qualified workers and control it tightly. For skilled workers from outside Europe, a model based on Japan's would apply, with a priority check, annual quotas, and a points system.

The AfD wants less immigration and tighter control. Only people with the right training should come. People from Germany and Europe should get jobs first. Anyone who comes must already speak German and have a job offer.

Before any further migration, people with a migration background already living here legally are to be brought into work first. The priority check would run in stages: domestic workers first, then European, and only then non-European; skilled workers who emigrated are to be brought back through return programs. Requirements include a job offer with a minimum salary and German at level B1, or B2 in fields such as nursing, already on arrival. Sectors and quotas would be set each year depending on the economy. For university graduates, the AfD wants to adjust the EU Blue Card regarding the priority check and minimum salary. It wants state programs to support language learning for qualified immigrants and their family members.

The AfD wants EU free movement understood as free movement of workers and wants to stop immigration into the welfare systems. Welfare entitlements of EU foreigners are to be reduced as far as EU law permits.

EU citizens may live and work in other EU countries. The AfD supports this for workers. But it wants fewer welfare benefits for EU foreigners. Offices should check more strictly who may stay.

The platform sees social peace in Ruhr-area cities such as Gelsenkirchen, Duisburg, or Dortmund as endangered by immigration from southeastern Europe. Immigration offices are to get more funding and staff to check consistently whether EU citizens' right of free movement exists or has been lost. In certain cases, re-entry bans should be possible.

The AfD demands a detailed and open accounting of immigration costs as a separate item in the NRW state budget. It argues that reliable figures on the costs of refugee policy are still missing.

The AfD wants to know what immigration costs the state. The state budget should show these costs separately. The AfD says there are no clear numbers so far.

According to the platform, it remains unclear what taking in more than two million people has cost in total. The spending is said to be spread across many budget sections at the federal, state, and local levels and is hard to track. The AfD concedes that not all costs can be pinned down, because budgets usually do not break spending down by group of people.

The AfD wants the local housing market to weigh more heavily when asylum seekers and recognized refugees are distributed among municipalities. In cities with a tight market, allocations should drop significantly.

Refugees are distributed among cities and towns. The AfD wants to consider the housing market when doing this. Where housing is scarce, fewer refugees should be sent. The party says this protects local people with little money.

According to the platform, the allocations increase demand for low-cost housing. The tight supply should not get worse at the expense of low-income local residents. In the AfD's view, affordable housing and large-scale immigration with open borders are incompatible.