Germany’s AfD party has gone too far, even for Europe’s far-right coalition

A right-wing German lawmaker made comments seen as so explosively outside the mainstream of acceptable political discourse, that his party was disowned by other far-right leaders, breaking a major coalition in the European Parliament.

Maximilian Krah, of the Alternative for Deutschland (AfD) party, told an Italian newspaper that he didn’t view all members of a notorious Nazi paramilitary group automatically as criminals. He claimed that some in the SS, whose primary role was guarding concentration camps during World War II, were in fact just farmers.