I don't understand how their refugee policy is getting this much flak. They pretty much support the status quo, which seems to give everybody a hate-boner for Merkel.

The only difference is that they call for an immigration law, which refugees would have to go through after there's peace in their home countries. I don't even know if that's worse for refugees - in the 90s Germany pretty much all refugees home after their status expired. And it's not like they were calling for the requirements to be super strict - just speaking German, not being a criminal and holding a job. That's not unfair in my opinion. Refugees should be safe, there's no discussion about that. But if they're not refugees, they're immigrants. And we always talk up immigration because immigrants add value to a country - but when they clearly don't do so by failing to learn German and relying on social security, there's no convincing reason to let them stay.

I hope there will be exceptions for children that grew up in Germany as refugees (and their families), as sending them back home would be too cruel for me, and I'm not sure if those exceptions would be made. But overall I don't really understand how this sub had the idea that FDP are a bunch of immigration hawks.