Trump's "MGGA" praise collides with Germany's Nazi past
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President Trump speaks with Germany's Chancellor Friedrich Merz during a work lunch as part of the G7 summit, in Evian, eastern France, on June 16. Photo: Christian Hartmann / POOL / AFP via Getty Images
President Trump used a call to restore German greatness Tuesday to celebrate a far-right party that others have denounced as antisemitic.
Why it matters: Trump promoting the AfD, or Alternative for Germany, comes as the nation's political mainstream has spent years keeping the party — which intelligence authorities has classified as extremist — out of power.
- The AfD won a record 44% in Saxony-Anhalt's elections, putting Germany within reach of its first far-right state government since World War II.
Driving the news: "Wow! The Populist Party in Germany just had a really big night," Trump wrote Tuesday on Truth Social.
- He continued: "They finally got tired of the absolutely horrible Immigration rules and regulations which have hurt Germany so badly. THEY ARE ON THE RISE, and not going to take it anymore! MGGA!!!"
- The White House did not immediately respond to Axios' request for comment, nor did it say what period of German history the president referred to when he used the acronym for "Make Germany Great Again."
Zoom out: National nostalgia in Germany is fraught because Nazi promises of renewed glory helped propel Adolf Hitler to power.
- Nazi propagandists sold their movement as one that would "restore national greatness and prosperity" and appealed to Germans yearning for national pride, according to the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.
- Chancellor Friedrich Merz said in July, "If a radical right-wing party came into a government in Germany, it would have a completely different meaning than if it happened in another" EU country, per The New York Times.
The latest: Merz postponed a planned Wednesday call with Trump hours after the president's post.
- Merz's spokesperson wouldn't say whether the two were connected, but told the AFP the delay wasn't due to a scheduling conflict and pointed to the chancellor's objections to foreign leaders commenting on German politics.
- On Wednesday, Merz likened the AfD's "remigration" campaign to "ethnic cleansing based on origin and skin color."
The big picture: Germany rebuilt its democracy after Nazi rule with strong safeguards against extremism. But the AfD's breakthrough shows those barriers aren't stopping a far-right surge — and critics fear some leaders' rhetoric trivializes the past.
- AfD leaders challenge Germany's postwar culture of Holocaust remembrance, with leader Alice Weidel calling it a "guilt cult." Former leader Alexander Gauland equated the Nazi era to a "speck of bird poop" in German history.
- AfD's Saxony-Anhalt premier candidate Ulrich Siegmund wouldn't say the Nazi era represented humanity's worst. Jewish leaders have criticized chants at his political events reminiscent of the Nazi "sieg heil."
- Leaders have also been accused of making anti-Muslim comments.
Catch up quick: Trump's praise matches other efforts by his allies to challenge Germany's isolation of the AfD.
- Elon Musk boosted the party as the only way to "save Germany." And Vice President JD Vance met with German leaders — including AfD's — last year and told the Munich Security Conference there was "no room for firewalls."
Zoom in: The president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, Josef Schuster, said he feared what AfD's proposed changes to education policy would mean for the fight against antisemitism.
- A recent American Jewish Committee brief said the party "frequently relies on conspiracy theories and coded language that echo longstanding antisemitic ideas."
- Trump has called rooting out antisemitism a key goal of his university and immigration crackdowns.
Go deeper: Europe's leaders are deeply unpopular
