More than 400 German police officers have been investigated on suspicion of far-right sympathies

Disciplinary cases and investigations are currently underway against more than four hundred German officers on suspicion of possible sympathies with the far right and their commitment to conspiracy ideologies. This is clear from the research conducted by the German news magazine strict And the German channel RTL. The actual number may be higher, because the interior ministries of the states of Berlin, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Bremen and Thuringia were unable to provide current figures. There are currently 96 disciplinary cases against police officers in Berlin, but the cases are not broken down by right- or left-wing political ideology in that state.

The head of the German Federal Police, Uli Grotsch, responds strict: “We live in a time when right-wing extremists are deliberately trying to destabilize the police.” According to him, the risk is “greater than ever.” The Minister of North Rhine-Westphalia, Minister Reuel, says that officers who do not support the Constitution pose a great danger to democracy and the rule of law. “You don't want those kind of people in the police.”

Research into police radicalization has been taking place in Germany for some time. In 2022, the Federal Ministry of the Interior published a report showing that over a three-year period, 327 police employees were linked to far-right ideologies.

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