Story by Kate Brady – msn.com
BERLIN — It was 1885 when Friedrich Trump first left Bad Dürkheim, in Germany’s western Palatinate region, for the United States. Now, 140 years later, the populist, anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party wants to make his grandson President Donald Trump an honorary citizen of the district.
Although the symbolic gesture seems likely to fail in a vote by the local council, which is controlled by mainstream conservatives, the attempt to honor the U.S. president is the latest AfD overture to the Trump administration and its supporters. Some AfD members see common cause with Trump and Vice President JD Vance, and their crusade against “wokeism” and antipathy toward migrants.
The AfD is under surveillance by German domestic intelligence, which has classified the party as far-right extremist. Calls have also grown in recent months to ban the AfD. Such a move would entail a years-long process and is fiercely debated — even by the party’s loudest critics.