Beatrix von Storch
Beatrix Amelie Ehrengard Eilika von Storch (née Duchess of Oldenburg;[a] 27 May 1971) is a German politician and lawyer, who has been the Deputy Leader of the Alternative for Germany since July 2015 and a Member of the Bundestag since September 2017. She previously was a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) from Germany.[1] From April 2016 to 2017 she was also a member of the right-wing populist Anti-EU group Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy. She is part of the right-wing conservative wing of the parliamentary group of the AfD. She belongs ancestrally to the royal House of Oldenburg which reigned over the Grand Duchy of Oldenburg until 1918.
Beatrix von Storch
Alternative for Germany (2013–present)
Free Democratic Party (2011–2013)
Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk (maternal grandfather)
Nikolaus, Hereditary Grand Duke of Oldenburg (paternal grandfather)
Family background[edit]
In accordance with the traditions of the House of Oldenburg, her dynastic style from birth was Her Highness Duchess Beatrix Amelie Ehrengard Eilika of Oldenburg. She is the elder daughter of Duke Huno of Oldenburg (b. 1940) and his wife, Countess Felicitas-Anita "Fenita" Schwerin von Krosigk (b. 1941).[2] Her father is a younger son of Nikolaus, Hereditary Grand Duke of Oldenburg (1897–1970), erstwhile head of the former ruling family of Oldenburg that lost its throne in 1918.[2] She belongs to the same male-line as the royal houses of Denmark and Norway, the deposed royal house of Greece and imperial Russia, and Charles III, king of the United Kingdom and 14 other Commonwealth realms,[2] to which last crown she is also distantly in line in accordance with the Act of Settlement 1701.
Her maternal grandfather was Lutz Graf Schwerin von Krosigk,[2] who served as finance minister from 1932 in the Weimar Republic until the defeat of Nazi Germany in 1945. After the death of Adolf Hitler and Joseph Goebbels he additionally served as the Leading Minister and foreign minister of the short-lived Flensburg Government of Karl Dönitz – and so as the de facto last head of government of Nazi Germany announced on 7 May 1945, via radio Reichssender Flensburg the unconditional surrender of the German Wehrmacht, thus ending the war in Europe.[3]
Her cousin, Eilika of Oldenburg, is married to Georg von Habsburg, a son of Otto, the last Crown Prince of Austria-Hungary.
Beatrix von Storch is also a direct descendant of Ludwig von Westphalen, the mentor of Karl Marx.[4]
Personal life[edit]
On 22 October 2010 she married German-Chilean businessman Sven von Storch (born 1970), member of a German noble family from Mecklenburg. He is the son of businessman Berndt Detlev von Storch (1930–2004) and Antje Liete Krüger-Franke (b. 1938).[5][6]
Education and early career[edit]
Von Storch was a banker before she studied law in Heidelberg and Lausanne. She worked as a lawyer in Berlin when she began her political career. She has also been a member of the Friedrich A. von Hayek Society.[7]
Controversies[edit]
Legal battle with the Berliner Schaubühne[edit]
In November 2015, a leading Berlin theatre, the Schaubühne, was brought into legal conflict with Beatrix von Storch over a play, Falk Richter's FEAR, that parodied AfD leaders as zombies and mass murderers.[21] Beatrix von Storch is depicted facing retribution for her grandfather's role as a minister in Hitler's government.[22] AfD Spokesperson Christian Lüth responded by interrupting a performance and filming it. Beatrix von Storch and the conservative activist Hedwig von Beverfoerde then requested and obtained a preliminary injunction against the theatre, prohibiting it from using images of them in the production. They charged that the use of the images violated their human dignity protected under the Constitution.[23] On 15 December 2015, the court ruled against the complainants in favour of the theatre's freedom of expression and lifted the injunctions against using the images. The judges commented that 'any audience member can recognize that this is just a play'.[24]
Remarks about use of deadly force against refugees[edit]
In late February 2016, von Storch was "pied" by members of the German left-wing group Peng Collective at a party meeting in Kassel. The activists, dressed as clowns, protested against her assertion that German border control personnel had the right to shoot at incoming illegal immigrants. A YouTube video of the assault gained wide attention in social media.[25][26]
"Rapist hordes" tweet[edit]
Von Storch's Twitter account was blocked for twelve hours after she posted a criticism of the Cologne Police Department for publishing a New Years greeting in Arabic as well as in German, French and English. She had written: "What the hell is wrong with this country? Why is the official page of the police in NRW tweeting in Arabic? Are they seeking to appease the barbaric, Muslim, rapist hordes of men?" Cologne was the location of multiple sexual assaults and robbery on New Year's Eve, December 2015 (see New Year's Eve sexual assaults in Germany). Other prominent members of the AfD quickly sprang to von Storch's defense, including Alice Weidel.[27]
(in German)
