Judgment on party funding
Constitutional judges could turn off the NPD money tap
7/4/2023 7:28 am
The NPD party, now home, endangers democracy but is too insignificant to be banned. This is how constitutional judges judged years ago. In a new process, however, the party could at least be excluded from party funding.
For the first time, the Federal Constitutional Court is examining whether a suspected anti-constitutional party has its state funds cut. Specifically, it’s about the NPD, which renamed itself Heimat in June. On Tuesday and Wednesday, the highest German court wants to clarify, among other things, how the party has developed since the recent verdict on an NPD ban. A decision is not expected until later.
In 2017, the Second Senate in Karlsruhe rejected a ban on the National Democratic Party of Germany, because there is no evidence that their anti-constitutional goals have been successfully implemented. However, he stated that the party represented “a political concept aimed at eliminating the existing free democratic basic order”. The judgment at that time also states that the legislature can create opportunities for sanctions below the threshold of the party ban.
That also happened in the months that followed: with an amendment to the Basic Law and a law to exclude anti-constitutional parties from party funding. Apparently there was talk of a “Lex NPD” at the time. This was followed by an application by the Bundestag, Bundesrat and federal government to the constitutional court, according to which the NPD, including possible substitute parties, should be excluded from party financing for six years. The tax privileges of the party and donations from third parties are also to be abolished.
According to the Federal Council, the applicants want to prevent “a party that disregards the free democratic basic order from being supported with the help of tax money – regardless of the amount – by the state whose essential constitutional values it rejects”. According to the Federal Ministry of the Interior, they submitted more than 300 pieces of evidence of ongoing anti-constitutional activities by the NPD in a 150-page application.
Parties can according to the Law on Parties get money from the state for their work. The sum is calculated according to a certain key, with votes playing a role, among other things. In order to be eligible, parties must achieve minimum shares in the most recent elections at state, federal and European level. Because the NPD not succeeded in the end, she received no money according to the latest figures from the Bundestag in 2021. One year ago it was around 370,600 euros – She benefited from 3.02 percent of the votes in the 2016 state elections in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. For comparison: In 2016, when the party was credited with more electoral successes according to the specifications, it was entitled to over 1.1 million euros. At that time, the SPD received the highest sum of almost 51 million euros.
“Heimat” sees equal opportunities violated
From the point of view of the NPD, the new regulation violates the principle of equal opportunities for parties anchored in the Basic Law as a core element of the principle of democracy. The exclusion from party funding significantly weakens the ability of the parties concerned to participate in the formation of public opinion. According to the court, the NPD argued in its application that a party is not legally obliged to conform to the constitution. She therefore considers the amendment to be unconstitutional and void.
However, the party recently failed at the constitutional court with an application to determine exactly that. The decision of the Senate states that the right of the party to equal opportunities in political competition will not be violated or directly endangered by the enactment of the law amending the Basic Law. “The enactment of the law alone does not lead to their exclusion from state funding,” explains the court. “Instead, this requires the initiation of proceedings before the Federal Constitutional Court.”