INACH newest report - Framing Hate: AfD migration messaging on social media in the 2025 German elections

This study employs a digital ethnographic action research approach to examine user-generated commentary on the official YouTube, Facebook, and X accounts of the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) during the party’s 2025 election campaign (27 December 2024–22 February 2025). The analysis focuses on discourse related to migration policy and immigrants, with particular attention to the ways in which hateful narratives are mobilised for political purposes. Drawing on a qualitative content analysis of user comments, the study delineates the continuum of anti-immigrant discourse—from the reproduction of negative stereotypes to the articulation of explicitly harmful and exclusionary rhetoric. The findings illuminate
how the AfD’s strategic framing of migration issues shapes and intensifies hostile user responses, thereby reinforcing xenophobic sentiment in the online sphere. The article concludes by advancing recommendations for countering such communicative strategies, with implications for policymakers, civil society actors, and digital platform governance.

Read the full report here