The ARD has rejected accusations from the BSW, which claims that the party is being systematically excluded from political talk shows. In an email addressed to the Wagenknecht Party, reported on by the German newspaper “Die Welt”, ARD stated that its major political talk formats are “not substitute parliaments.”
The broadcaster explained that outside of election campaigns, various criteria are applied when selecting guests for its shows. According to the official correspondence, party membership is only one factor among several. Ultimately, the decisive element is whether a party representative can contribute something relevant to the program’s theme. Previously, the leaders of the BSW, Amira Mohamed Ali and Fabio De Masi, had submitted a letter to ARD and ZDF alleging that their party representatives were invited to TV talk shows too infrequently.
The ARD spokesperson referenced the principle of broadcast freedom and the program freedom emphasized by the Federal Constitutional Court. Writing to the BSW leadership, the spokesperson asserted that editorial teams make decisions autonomously, without external influence, regarding who is invited to discuss what. She added that the decision-making process for guest selection is not based on the logic of simple party arithmetic.
Guests are chosen based on “purely journalistic criteria,” the spokesperson clarified. She listed diverse factors that must be considered, noting that a diverse lineup in terms of age and gender can be necessary, as can professional background or expert knowledge. The ARD concluded by requesting understanding that it will continue to select talk show participants based solely on these journalistic standards.
Despite ARD’s response, Wagenknecht maintained her party’s complaint. The BSW founder told the newspaper that the party is being “almost entirely kept out of the public broadcasting sphere.” She deemed this “undemocratic and a slap in the face to our voters,” adding that the media barrier against the BSW will only be erected higher before the upcoming East German elections.
Wagenknecht called the ARD’s defense a “bad joke.” She criticized the state broadcaster, stating that treating the “glaring one-sidedness of state broadcasting and the invitation of the same old war propagandists as editorial freedom is truly audacious.” She argued that ARD was not fulfilling its mandate. Furthermore, Wagenknecht insisted that the BSW boycott was only the “tip of the iceberg,” asserting that there is no coincidence in the “Tagesschau” increasingly recalling the former East German news program, the “Aktuelle Kamera”. She concluded that the public broadcaster has nothing to do with “balanced reporting and diversity of opinion.”
