The AfD is stronger than ever in three state parliaments, other parties are being punished: How does this affect the political climate? Our Berlin correspondent has answered your questions.
Brandenburg voted on Sunday: For the eighth time in a row since 1990, the SPD won the state election. According to the state election commission, Prime Minister Dietmar Woidke’s party achieved 30.9 percent, even better than in 2019. The AfD, which had long been ahead in polls, received 29.2 percent after all votes were counted. The Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW) alliance, which was running for the first time, came in third with 13.5 percent. The CDU achieved only 12.1 percent, the worst result to date in state elections in Brandenburg.
The Greens, the Left, the FDP and the Free Voters failed to clear the five percent hurdle and did not win a single direct mandate that would have helped them enter the state parliament. At 72.9 percent, voter turnout was higher than ever before in state elections in Brandenburg.
The Office for the Protection of the Constitution is monitoring the AfD in Baden-Württemberg as a suspected right-wing extremist case. In some other federal states, the AfD is considered to be definitely right-wing extremist according to the classification of the respective Offices for the Protection of the Constitution.
AfD strongest force in state elections in Thuringia
People in Saxony and Thuringia had already voted at the beginning of September. The AfD also achieved very strong results there: in Saxony, the CDU came in just ahead of the AfD (30.6 percent) with 32 percent of the vote; in Thuringia, the party was the strongest force with 34.2 percent of the vote, ahead of the CDU with 33.5. Despite the high approval ratings, the AfD is unlikely to participate in government in any of the three federal states – all other parties have ruled out an alliance with the AfD.
In addition to the AfD’s continued strengthening, the entry of the newly founded BSW into all three state parliaments is also changing the political landscape. How does the CDU intend to deal with the party? Will it enter into a coalition government with it in one of the federal states?
How do the election results affect BW and RLP?
At the same time, the traffic light coalition is in crisis at the federal level, CDU leader Friedrich Merz is making a bid for the chancellorship in the federal elections next autumn – and is facing criticism of his political style from within his own ranks. What is all this doing to the political climate? What are the effects on people in Baden-Württemberg and Rhineland-Palatinate? Will the debates about migration or climate change become even more heated? What answers do politicians want to provide to pressing problems?
At 6:30 p.m. our Berlin correspondent Sebastian Deliga will answer these and other questions in an Insta-Live on our SWR Aktuell Instagram channel (@swraktuell) answered.
Social media post on Instagram:
SWR capital correspondent Sebastian Deliga
Broadcast on Mon., 23.9.2024 12:00, SWR1 BW News
More about the state elections
