Weapons legislation should be strengthened to fight against right-wing “extremists”, Germany’s Federal Justice Minister has told local media.

Heiko Maas told state broadcaster ARD that the potential for violence among so-called “imperial citizens” has “risen markedly” and said Germans should have to sign a paper confirming commitment to the constitution in order to receive a weapons permit.

It is claimed “Imperial citizens” are Germans from the “conspiracy theory scene” who believe the constitution of the Federal Republic of Germany has not been “legitimised by the people” and have been described as similar in political beliefs to “Brexiteers” and people who support U.S. President-Elect Donald Trump.

Ralf Jäger told interior ministers in Saarbruecken that “everything must be done so that extremists cannot get possession of weapons”. The Social Democratic Party (SPD) Interior Minister of North Rhine-Westphalia also indicated that it should be possible to withdraw weapons permits if people refuse to sign their approval of the constitution.

Maas told ARD he advocates the measure but, fearing “extremists” already have weapons, the Social Democrat minister said it comes too late. The debate on firearms intensified in Germany after a policeman was shot by an “imperial citizen” in October.

There is resistance among politicians in the ruling Union parties, however. The European Union’s (EU) internal political spokesman Stephan Mayer, of the Christian Social Union (CSU) told Focus he’s concerned that the measure would condemn “hundreds of thousands of shooters and hunters”.

An inquiry by the radical Left party in 2012 into crimes committed by so-called imperial citizens found what Zeit calls a “long list”, which features “driving without a license, theft, fraud, forgery, violations of the weapons law, [and] extortion”.

Dr. Johannes Thumfart describes “imperial citizens” as being from the same “nest” as “Brexiteers” and supporters of Trump. Despite the country already having some of the world’s strictest weapon laws, he believes Germans should be further disarmed.

Writing in Spiegel on “imperial citizens”, he says right wingers in Europe share “an ominous alliance with Putin, who is armed to the teeth” and that the EU is “particularly suited to inspiring loyalty and heroism”.

In it, the former philosophy lecturer at the Free University of Berlin argues for a “new European exceptionalism”, saying the EU must define itself as “the moral leadership of the free world” because “it becomes increasingly clear that the large projects of the West like social justice, individual freedom, sexual self-determination and ecological sustainability are not found anywhere else”.

Thumfart believes America’s right to bear arms is “racist” because white people tend to use their guns to commit suicide rather than murder “each other en masse”, which he says black people do.