The election must be repeated in 455 electoral districts and the associated postal voting districts, said the presiding judge, Doris König. The repeat election should be carried out as a two-vote election, i.e. with first and second votes.
An election audit complaint by the Union faction in the German Bundestag was only partially successful. With its ruling, the highest German court did not follow a decision of the Bundestag exactly. With the votes of the traffic light factions SPD, Greens and FDP, he decided that the election should be partially repeated. This would have affected 327 of the 2,256 electoral districts in the German capital as well as 104 of the 1,507 postal voting districts. From the perspective of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, the decision was illegal, among other things because the Bundestag did not declare the election invalid as a whole in six constituencies that were contested by the Federal Returning Officer. Therefore she filed a lawsuit in Karlsruhe.
The Federal Constitutional Court has now declared the election invalid in a further 31 electoral districts than those mentioned in the Bundestag’s decision. However, the decision is ultimately lawful.
Election day on September 26, 2021 was chaotic in many Berlin polling stations: people had to wait a long time and queue, ballot papers were incorrect or missing entirely. Polling stations had to temporarily close or remained open until well following 6 p.m. – the time when voting was supposed to be over. Then there are usually initial predictions regarding the result.
1,713 objections were raised to the Bundestag once morest the federal election in the state of Berlin, including one from the Federal Returning Officer. That was around eight times as many objections as in previous elections, Judge Peter Müller said at the hearing in July.
Judge Müller explained that so much time has passed since the election with the two-stage review process: first it is a matter for the Bundestag, only later for the Constitutional Court. Because of the high number of objections, no earlier date was possible, even with the greatest possible acceleration, said Müller.
Because of the mishaps on September 26, 2021, the Berlin Constitutional Court declared the election to the House of Representatives invalid due to “serious systemic deficiencies” and numerous voting errors. This election was completely repeated on February 12, 2023 – with the result that a black-red coalition replaced the three-way alliance of the SPD, the Greens and the Left that had governed since 2016.
Left relieved
The Left expressed relief following the verdict. “With the verdict it is clear that we will remain in the Bundestag and continue to fulfill our role as a social opposition,” said former parliamentary group leader Dietmar Bartsch to the German Press Agency on Tuesday. The partial repetition in only 455 of around 2,200 electoral districts might not change the outcome in the two constituencies in which the Left won direct mandates, said Bartsch. The result: The directly elected MPs Gesine Lötzsch and Gregor Gysi as well as the Leipzig MP Sören Pellmann remain in the Bundestag. This in turn secures the mandates of all 39 MPs who still belong to the left today as well as those who have since left, including the group around Sahra Wagenknecht.
If the election had been repeated in its entirety, a different scenario would have emerged: Then one of the direct mandates might have been lost and with it all the seats of the Left and the Wagenknecht group, which were awarded via lists in 2021. The party is now spared this. “This means that a small but important hurdle has been overcome,” said Bartsch. The next step is to recognize the 28 remaining left-wing MPs as a separate group.
