The reminders of the Nazi past of Germany everywhere in the city of Pforzheim.

The small copper “struggling” mark scattered in the streets distinguishes the homes of the Jews who were deported and killed. “Father forgiveness” is a sign on the side of a church that commemorates the Loffawa air strikes in the English city of Kovantry and the bombing of British carpets that killed a third of PFORZHEIM.

No other modern nation did as much Germany To face its history and warn the subsequent generations of the dangers of demagogs, which are with easy solutions and stirring hatred.

However, 80 years after the end of World War II, voters are suggested on February 23 to grant second place to the alternative to Germany (AFD), a party that plays with Nazi slogans and called for that Collective deportation From immigrants.

In Pforzheim, 130,000 city in the southern western Baden -Forepeners state, which is now targeting a large number of western cities after that streak In the former Communist East – I have already enjoyed some of its strongest electoral results anywhere in western Germany.

Pushing the industrial decline and unusually high levels of immigration to the voters towards the pro -Russian party, anti -European Union, and emphasized the limits of Germany’s internationally famous efforts to overcome its past.

“We must be in Germany in fact somewhat fortified from this right -wing virus,” said Ben Heifner, a high school history teacher in Forsheim, who saw with the alert as the party attracted a small but prominent minority of his students. “But unfortunately, Germany is increasingly infected with it.”

While he, like senior political experts, he says AFD It is not the same as the Party of Adolf Hitler Nazi, as it is seen as a serious threat to the liberal democratic regime “stipulated in the post -war constitution.

PFORZHHEIM, nicknamed the “Golden City” of its traditions in jewelry and watching watches, was a long period of Christian Democrats in the center in Germany (CDU)-one of them is the major “people’s concerts” that has led every German government west since then 1949.

But since it stumbled with social and economic problems, it has proven fertile ground for AFD. The party won 23 percent in the European elections in Pforzheim last June. In a local vote on the same day, it took control of the city council.

AFD face in Pforzheim is Diana Zimmer, 26 -year -old who leads her local party group and runs to Bundestag.

Zimer, who often focuses on the need to revive the stagnant economy in Germany, is seeking to move away from AFD arm from AFD from the most radical party numbers.

However, the regional branch is classified as a right -wing extremist organization suspected by the local intelligence service in Germany. Last month, in the neighboring city of Carlserw, AFD developed “deportation tickets” through messages boxes in areas with large numbers of immigrants – a step that Zimmer tries to play as a “way to circumvent”.

History does not appear in the public election publications. But Zimmer expresses his sympathy for a modern intervention by Elon Musk, the richest man in the world and a new AFD FansHe said that there was a “great focus on the past guilt” in Germany.

She said: “I think it will be good when we sometimes aim to calm down a little and say: I love Germany, I love my country.”

The relationship with the Second World War in Forsheim is complicated by the destruction that suffered from it, as about 17,600 people were killed by the British Royal Air Force in a 22 -minute bombing in 1945, although the city had no large heavy industry or ammunition plants. “What happened was a war crime – but you are not allowed to say it,” a local AFD official complained.

The city reserves Shami’s right to celebrate the anniversary – which coincides this year with the parliamentary elections. For decades, the march of the flame was also held by dozens of neo -Nazis who depict the Germans as victims of the Second World War. As in previous years, the authorities expect that the anti -fascist demonstrators will attend, and will attend several hundreds of police.

History, though, weighs less for most voters than instant fears.

Although gold stores are still scattered in the city center, the jewelry industry has been declining since the 1980s.

One of the decisive sectors today – the supply chain in the auto industry – faces a state of great uncertainty amid an existential crisis in the German auto industry. Recently, there has been a jump for work for a short period as troubled companies seek to stick to workers but reduced their hours.

What makes Pforzheim really stand out, though, is the large number of immigrants for a city of its size. In the years that followed Angela Merkel’s 2015 decision to open Germany borders to those who fled the conflict, it became a haven for people from the Yazidi minority of Iraq, as well as some Syrians and Ukrainians.

There are also many workers from the European Union countries, including Romania, Hungary and Poland. Thirty percent of the population holds a foreign passport and 6.5 percent of asylum seekers – much higher than the national averages concerned with 14.6 percent and 3.8 percent.

Joachim Holsman, head of the city’s Youth and Social Welfare Office, said there are many success stories about families that have become part of the local community.

But expatriates have also weakened great pressure on public services. He said: “It was not happy after that.” “There were many difficulties.”

Merkel put the decision to welcome asylum seekers as part of Germany’s historical responsibility towards Europe and the world.

But local families – including previous generations of Turkish and Italian immigrants – rarely see them in this way. “My three children can find work,” said a 57 -year -old woman from Turkey, who lives in the dominant Ostadt region. “Refugees get everything free.”

While PFORZHHEIM was the safest city in Baden-Württemberg in 2023, according to the latest available statistics, the police admit that many people do not feel safe. A series of recent deadly attacks by asylum seekers in other places in Germany amplified these concerns and reached the national discussion discussion.

AFD, which wants to lift sanctions on Moscow and the resumption of gas flows from Russia, has found a particularly receptive audience between the large Pforzheim community of Russian Germans who fled from the Soviet Union. Zimer, from AFD, is the same as the daughter of the Russian immigrants.

“The results are talking about herself,” Zimer said, noting the fact that the share of its party’s vote has reached 49 percent in the powerful Russian Baknberg Hydech.

In the new municipal hall in Pforzheim, parties are at the top of the records on how to deal with AFD, the largest force in the council – in a mini -image of the arguments playing on the national stage.

CDU, the second largest faction in the council, submitted in December a request to reduce the property tax issued with voices from the far right. Last month, party leader Friedrich Mirz caused political anger by taking a similar step, passing a suggestion that is not obligated to migrate with voices from AFD-first in Parliament in Germany after the war.

Andreas Renner, leader of the CDU faction in the council, stressed that there are no discussions with the far right before this step. But he said that it was a “mistake” by other parties that they were ever to allow suggestions to help AFD, on the pretext that he must focus on the age of changes of concern to voters.

However, Annkathrin Wulff, head of the Social Democracy Group (SPD), said that there should be no cooperation in the council with AFD, which was not a “natural” party. Her and her SPD believes in treating unemployment, inequality and poverty that can make voters feel threatened with immigration – but they also face what they see as AFD on this issue.

Opinion polls indicate that AFD will win the country’s level of at least 20 percent. Amidst the main parties about its rise, analysts note that the vast majority of German voters still say they will never vote. They do not want to include the extreme right in the coalition talks.

But PFORZHHEIM shows how this consensus can be under pressure.

Young workers are depicting AFD’s success in using Tiktok to target the members of the Zil Z, who are likely to vote for the party more than people over the age of the Corona virus.

Some people in the city have left wondering whether the extreme right’s tendencies could be passed through generations, because more than 57 percent of Pforzheimers voted for the Nazi Party in 1933.

Julia Bahlk, the leader of young people in the local non -profit organization, SJR, is trying to educate young people about the actual AFD policies and put the party in the context of German history. But they are struggling to make contact.

“It is very far away,” she said. “Young people live here and now.”

Data is visualized by Martin Stap and Jonathan Vincent