Stuttgart – ESI presentation on global migration

2 April 2025
stuttgart
Landtag of Baden-Württemberg. Photo: flickr / Thomas Korte

ESI’s Gerald Knaus was invited to give a presentation on “The current challenges of global migration and its impact on Germany” for members of the European Affairs Committee at the State Parliament of Baden-Württemberg.

Gerald encouraged the MPs to focus on measures that quickly show results in refugee policy rather than making promises that can’t be kept. Gerald said, “Wherever I go, I praise the special task force on dangerous foreigners that exists in Baden-Württemberg.” He then added that the federal states should focus on this.

Furthermore, Gerald suggested that the new federal government should bring everyone together to increase deportation numbers by consensus. He stressed that the population is particularly annoyed or frightened when it is discovered that crimes are being committed by people who have already committed crimes. Therefore, Gerald said the states responsible for deportations must work hard on this.

Gerald also made it clear that he does not believe in making promises that cannot be kept. As an example, he cited the impression given by the CDU federal chairman Friedrich Merz regarding the closure of borders. “It is neither feasible nor sensible,” he said, for “well-trained federal police officers to be watching a road in Kufstein while people can pass the green border unhindered just a little further on”. Rather, the political centre must show “that control can be established on the issue of migration without sacrificing human dignity and the rule of law”.

Migration control is always possible, Gerald concluded. The challenge for democrats, however, is to implement effective humane control.