Overview
- The new state branch, founded Saturday in Fulda, elected 27-year-old Nafiur Rahman chair with 47 of 50 votes.
- Police estimated about 1,000 people at the demonstrations and street festival outside the venue, and officers reported one arrest and a minor injury to a colleague.
- The Fulda launch makes Hesse the 15th branch, with GD citing roughly 2,600 members nationwide and about 170 in the state.
- GD replaces the dissolved Junge Alternative and is now part of the AfD, while security officials flag continuity concerns and monitor federal leader Jean-Pascal Hohm for extremist ties.
- Compared with November’s national founding in Gießen that drew about 25,000 and saw clashes, Saturday’s events ran on schedule and delegates traveled without blockades.