The hooligan in the State Department
AfD politicians attend Washington conference to build contacts in the House. State Department expands its networks with Europe’s extreme right, including the AfD – even welcoming an ultra-right British hooligan for talks.
WASHINGTON/BERLIN (own report) – Politicians from the AfD and other far-right parties in Europe have been busy networking with the US House of Representatives at a conference currently being held in Washington. The conference, entitled ‘Alliance of Sovereign Nations’ and billed as “a kind of anti-Davos”, was initiated by Republican Congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna. Luna has been forging close ties with the AfD since last autumn. She is also supporting an attempted political asylum claim by a German activist who has close ties to the AfD and paints herself as a victim of state persecution in Germany. Meanwhile, an undersecretary at the US State Department has the task of campaigning against the alleged undermining of freedom of expression for right-wingers in Europe. One particular target of Sarah Rogers’ efforts in Europe is the European Union’s Digital Services Act (DSA). The DSA is a thorn in the side of American tech oligarchs such as Elon Musk. Rogers has also built contacts with AfD politicians. There are reports that she is distributing US State Department funds to organisations in Europe close to Trump. Recently, the department even welcomed for talks a figurehead of the far-right British hooligan scene who has multiple convictions.
Right-wing meeting in Washington
The far-right conference, entitled ‘Alliance of Sovereign Nations’, which began on Wednesday in the US capital and ends this Friday, is being hosted by Turning Point Action. This initiative is an offshoot of the right-wing youth organisation Turning Point USA, which was founded by the activist Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated on 10 September 2025. The star guest is the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Mike Johnson. Several other Republican members of the House of Representatives are billed to attend, along with various right-wing politicians from Latin America and Europe. In addition to the Partido Nacional de Honduras, whose members include the country’s Trump-aligned president, Nasry Asfura, several representatives of far-right parties in the European Union have travelled to the event. They include MEPs Petra Steger (from the FPÖ in Austria), Barbara Bonte (from the Vlaams Belang in Belgium), and George Simion (president of the far-right Alliance for the Union of Romanians). The latter won 46.4 per cent of the vote in the second round of the Romanian presidential election on 18 May 2025. His party, AUR, had been leading the polls for months with around 37 per cent supporting their anti-EU position.
Political asylum in the United States?
The Washington conference was reportedly initiated by Anna Paulina Luna, a member of the House of Representatives who has frequently met with AfD politicians in recent months. Luna has praised the AfD, saying the German far-right party is “really working ... to strengthen relations with the United States” and to “restore a healthy relationship between our two governments”.[1] In the last quarter of 2025, she welcomed AfD Bundestag parliamentarians Anna Rathert, Markus Frohnmaier and Kay Gottschalk to Washington, as well as German activist Naomi Seibt, who has been living in the US since 2024. Seibt is close to the AfD and claims she is suffering political persecution in Germany because of her opinions. She applied for asylum in the US last autumn. This case sheds a light on the Trump administration’s discussion of a new asylum policy: the idea is to largely abolish existing rights for genuine asylum seekers while replacing them with a set of rules primarily designed to grant refuge to white people, in Europe or elsewhere, who are sanctioned for racist speech.[2] Luna has announced that she supports Seibt’s application and is confident that it will be granted. Seibt, she says, “deserves ... political asylum in the United States.”[3]
High-level foreign policy talks
Luna is meeting with Markus Frohnmaier at the Washington conference. Frohnmaier is the foreign policy spokesperson for the AfD parliamentary group in the Bundestag. And he is currently running as the AfD’s lead candidate in the Baden-Württemberg state elections on 8 March. Frohnmaier, once known for his close ties to Russia, travelled to the US capital several times last autumn and met for talks at the State Department on each occasion.[4] He can currently be considered a key figure in the pro-Trump wing of the AfD. For instance, in the internal party debate over Trump’s violent abduction of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, Frohnmaier has spoken out to justify US actions.[5] He is currently defending the Israeli and US attack on Iran, even against the stance of AfD leaders, who have openly disagreed with him. Frohnmaier believes that “the Trump administration” has acted “with surgical precision and clear focus” and must be supported as “our most important partner” in the region.[6] AfD Bundestag deputy Anna Rathert, who is close to the ultra-right wing of the party around Björn Höcke, also travelled to Washington for the gathering. Rathert was invited to the Munich Security Conference, where she met with officials from the US State Department. She described her discussions with the Americans as “very constructive” and “very gratifying”.[7]
Freedom of expression for racists
Another lynchpin the pro-Trump networks – alongside Luna, Frohnmaier and Rathert – is Sarah Rogers. She been serving as Assistant Secretary of State for Public Diplomacy at the US State Department since October and has become a key figure helping to consolidate the transatlantic far-right networks. Rogers has already made two trips to Europe. The first took her to the UK, France and Italy in December, the second to Ireland, Hungary, Poland and Germany in February, where she attended the Munich Security Conference. In Italy and Hungary, where far-right parties are in power, she spoke with government officials and pro-government organisations. In the UK she met with, among others, politicians from Nigel Farage’s far-right Reform UK party, and in Poland with Agnieszka Jędrzak, an ultra-nationalist undersecretary in the chancellery of President Karol Nawrocki. Rogers is campaigning against actual or even alleged action in Europe against racist incitement. She frames such action as a violation of freedom of expression. In denouncing anti-racist measures she is targeting, not least, the Digital Services Act (DSA), which is a thorn in the side of US internet oligarchs such as Elon Musk. There are reports that the State Department now wants to channel funds through Rogers into Europe to finance organisations close to Trump – including forces operating in Paris, Brussels and Berlin.[8] The Trump administration is currently denying this.
Too far for the far right?
It is unclear whether Sarah Rogers, who in January called refugees in Germany “barbarian, rapist hordes”,[9] has also met with Tommy Robinson. Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, emerged as an activist from the violent hooligan scene. He founded the anti-Muslim English Defence League (EDL) in 2009. This grouping has long collapsed, but Robinson has continued with an internet presence to propagate hatred with remarkable success. Last September he organised what is believed to be the largest far-right demonstration in British history, with an estimated 150,000 participants on the streets of London. He himself has multiple criminal convictions, including assault, holding a forged passport, mortgage fraud, and all sorts of other offences. Even the far-right Reform UK party refuses to work with him. Yet it became known at the end of last year that Elon Musk had covered his legal expenses. And, at the end of February, Robinson was actually received at the US State Department for a meeting with officials. The content of the talks and the list of his interlocutors have not been revealed.
[1] Stefanie Bolzen: „In Deutschland läuft derzeit vieles schief“ – Wie sich die internationale Rechte formiert. welt.de 03.03.2026.
[2] Zolan Kanno-Youngs, Hamed Aleaziz: Trump Considers Overhaul of Refugee System That Would Favor White People. nytimes.com 15.10.2025.
[3] Stefanie Bolzen: „Leider ist das deutsche Volk seit langer Zeit so programmiert“. welt.de 16.11.2025.
[4] Sonja Álvarez: Wie Donald Trumps Nachwuchskader die AfD an der Wall Street feiern. wiwo.de 15.12.2025.
[5] See: Party of the new order.
[6] Markus Frohnmaier: Nach Teheran-Schlag braucht es eine realistische Politik im deutschen Interesse.
[7] AfD-Abgeordnete trifft Mitarbeiter Rubios – Treffen in Washington geplant. web.de 15.02.2026.
[8] Anna Gross, Lucy Fisher, David Sheppard, Amy Mackinnon: US government to fund Maga-aligned think-tanks and charities in Europe. ft.com 05.02.2026. Karl Mathiesen, Marion Solletty, Tim Ross, Mari Eccles, Nette Nöstlinger: The MAGA-friendly European think tanks Trump wants to fund. politico.eu 13.02.2026.
[9] Wie Trump die AfD hofiert. t-online.de 05.03.2026.
[10] Nadeem Badshah: Trump administration meets with UK far-right activist Tommy Robinson. theguardian.com 25.02.2026.
