After the scandal that prompted him to take a month off, the politician, who recently left the Greens, does not appear to have returned to office in a relaxed and level-headed manner, as an open letter to climate activist Luisa Neubauer shows.
Tübingen’s Lord Mayor Boris Palmer wrote a disapproving letter to climate activist Luisa Neubauer immediately after his break. The 51-year-old returned to his job in the Swabian university town last Friday – after a four-week break, which he had prescribed for himself after a scandal surrounding statements relating to the holocaust at the sidelines of a migration conference at the end of April.
Palmer confirmed to the German Press Agency on Tuesday that he had written the page-long letter to Neubauer on the day his work resumed. Palmer refers to a speech by the “Fridays for Future” activist during his break, which she gave as part of her “Tübingen media lectureship”.
Boris Palmer defends fossil fuels
He reproaches her for criticizing the “fossil” lifestyle, which is “nothing more than a frontal attack on the Western model of prosperity.” The former Green Party politician points out that human progress in crucial areas of life would not have been possible without the use of “easily and cheaply available fossil energy sources”. He accuses Neubauer of pursuing the wrong approach to climate policy and thus conjuring up “new opposition”.
In April, in a verbal argument before a migration conference in Frankfurt am Main, when he was confronted with shouts of “Nazis out,” Palmer replied: “It’s nothing other than the Jewish star.” Companions and party friends then turned away from him, Palmer then apologized for giving the impression that he was relativizing the Holocaust.
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At the time, he had announced a break to “gain enough distance and gain strength”. After the escalation of his controversial statements, he also left the Greens. Palmer has been mayor of Tübingen since 2007. With statements about refugee policy, he repeatedly caused controversy and was exposed to accusations of racism.
Source: Stern
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