The results of Germany’s Saxony-Anhalt state election on September 6 were far worse than feared for the country’s mainstream political parties. The far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) came close to winning a majority of votes, with 43.8%. This was about 4% higher than polls had suggested.
Support for the centre-right Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU), on the other hand, imploded. It won 17.2% of the vote, down from 37.1% in 2021, performing substantially worse than predicted.
At nearly 78%, turnout was up substantially compared with 2021 – in a way that helped the AfD. Analysis suggests the growth in its support came mostly from former non-voters, joined by a substantial number of erstwhile CDU supporters.
The polarised nature of the election, with 41% of voters surveyed beforehand wanting an AfD-led government but 46% favouring one led by the CDU, had some surprising effects. One was that it flattered the social democratic SPD and the Greens.
Both the SPD and Greens received tactical support from CDU and Left Party voters to make sure they reached the 5% of votes required to win seats in the state parliament. The AfD, which had said it would only seek to govern if it had a majority, now has several paths to seeing its candidate, Ulrich Siegmund, elected as Saxony-Anhalt’s minister president. Most likely is a deal with the Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW), a party that combines left-wing economic policies with conservative ones on topics such as migration. On election night, the BSW made clear it had “overlaps” with AfD positions in some areas and that it would be “completely undemocratic” for the AfD to be excluded entirely from government.
If this failed, some support from the CDU would be a further route. The election of minister president is a secret ballot, and several CDU MPs reelected on Sunday have a long history of suggesting there should be more openness to working with the AfD.
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