Germany: Police raid pensioner’s house and drag him to court after he retweets meme calling Green minister an ‘idiot’

Massive police repression in Germany as war against free speech and basic human rights ratchets up under left-liberal government.

After a 64-year-old pensioner retweeted a meme of Green Economy Minister Robert Habeck, in which Habeck was described as an “idiot,” Bavarian police raided the man’s house and arrested him. The crime has even been recorded as a “politically motivated right-wing crime.”

The man is accused of distributing a photo of Habeck via retweet, where Habeck is described as an “idiot.” The Bamberg prosecutor’s office indicates that this constitutes a federal criminal offense of “hatred.”

“At a time that cannot currently be specified in more detail in the days or weeks before June 20, 2024, the accused published an image file using the account that shows a portrait of Federal Minister of Economics Robert Habeck with the title ‘Schwachkopf PROFESSIONAL’, based on the advertising campaign of the Schwarzkopf company, in order to generally defame Robert Habeck and to make it more difficult for him to work as a member of the federal government,” read the prosecutor’s statement.

Schwachkopf generally means “idiot,” in German.

The rival Alternative for Germany (AfD) party has reposted the meme on X, writing in a statement:

“While Habeck presents himself as a ‘people-friendly’ candidate for chancellor, his critics are being relentlessly pursued. They do not shy away from conducting house searches on sleeping families just because the father of the family shared this Schwachkopf graphic. This is what would happen to Germany under a Chancellor Habeck: the complete restriction of freedom of expression by a children’s book author who displayed maximum incompetence for three and a half years, but still feels called to greater things,” wrote the AfD.

Posted using SoMee