Investigation Reveals Alleged Cooperation Between EPP and Far-Right AfD

A dpa investigation published on March 14, 2026 revealed that internal chat logs show close cooperation between the European People's Party Group led by Manfred Weber and the far-right Alternative for Germany party within the European Parliament, directly challenging the so-called Brandmauer policy intended to isolate far-right parties from mainstream conservative cooperation. The investigation, reported across multiple German-language outlets including Süddeutsche Zeitung, Bayerischer Rundfunk, stern.de, and tagesschau.de, centers on the content of internal communications that allegedly document the nature and extent of this cooperation. The findings immediately reignited a broader political debate in Germany and across the European Union about the boundaries between mainstream conservatism and the far right. Weber, who has served as President of the EPP since 2022 and as Leader of the EPP Group in the European Parliament since 2014, is the central figure named in the reports. The EPP is the largest political group in the European Parliament.

The Brandmauer concept has been a defining fault line in German and European politics, with mainstream parties repeatedly pledging to refuse any formal cooperation with the AfD. The dpa investigation's claim that internal chats document an alliance or cooperation in Brussels directly contradicts those public commitments. The reports across German outlets consistently describe the chats as internal documents, though the specific content of the messages has not been confirmed through independent sources beyond the dpa reporting. Die Welt framed the story specifically around the Brandmauer debate, describing the chats as showing close cooperation between the EPP and AfD factions in the European Parliament. The publication of these findings on March 14 drew immediate political reactions.

Sandro Gozi, Secretary General of the European Democratic Party and a Renew Europe member of the European Parliament, responded to the reports with direct criticism of the EPP. „from the EPP comes an extremist drift that weakens Europe” — Sandro Gozi via ANSA.it Gozi's statement framed the alleged cooperation not merely as a procedural breach but as a broader ideological shift within the EPP that he argued undermines the European project. His intervention added a cross-party European dimension to what had initially been reported primarily as a German political controversy. The ANSA report on Gozi's remarks was published at 15:28 CET on March 14, roughly an hour after the initial dpa findings began circulating in German media.

The EPP, founded in 1976 by primarily Christian democratic parties, has since broadened its membership to include liberal-conservative parties. The AfD has 15 members of the European Parliament and 151 members of the Bundestag, where it serves as the largest opposition party. The question of cooperation between mainstream European conservatives and far-right parties has been a recurring source of tension within the European Parliament, with the EPP's relationship to nationalist and populist parties on its right flank drawing repeated scrutiny from centrist and left-leaning groups. The Brandmauer debate has been particularly acute in Germany, where all major parties have publicly committed to refusing coalition arrangements or legislative cooperation with the AfD at federal level. No response from Weber or the EPP Group to the dpa investigation's findings was confirmed in the source articles available as of the time of publication.