🇩🇪 German state & local elections

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Even with the CDU ahead, I think it's quite likely Malu Dreyer will be reelected as Minister-President for another term. [...] But he is virtually unknown and Germans usually love their incumbent Minister-Presidents.

The past proved otherwise; incumbent governors usually enjoy high favorability ratings; nonetheless that doesn't necessarily affect their party's election results.

Prior to the 2005 Schleswig-Holstein state election, for instance, 51% of the citizens wanted Heide Simonis to remain Governor (as against her CDU contender Peter Harry Carstensen's 37%). In the end, Simonis' SPD narrowly and surprisingly lost the state election.

That same year, the North Rhine-Westphalia state election led to a even more surprising and even more severe defeat of the SPD even though their incumbent Governor Peer Steinbrück was more popular than the eventual winner Jürgen Rüttgers of the CDU; if there had been a direct election of the Governor, Steinbrück would have won it 39%-31%.

The only state election I can remember where an unpopular incumbent governor won re-election was the Hesse Landtag election: Governor Roland Koch trailed his challenger Andrea Ypsilanti owing to his merciless law-and-order stance and his extremely neoliberal and neoconservative worldview, but eventually Koch's CDU eked out an unpredicted win, which led to a year of anarchy until all parties agreed upon snap elections.

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But ever since, there were only 3 cases of Minister-Presidents who really "lost" an election as there was no possibility to govern for their party anymore (excluding Bodo Ramelow with the Kemmerich situation and the two Bremen dudes who resigned after the election but their party retained power): Christine Lieberknecht in 2014, Torsten Albig and Hannelore Kraft in 2017. Their approval ratings were generally okay, but not overwhelming and their lead in direct match-up polling had dwindled.

Oh, you shouldn't have mentioned Hannelore Kraft; she's a perfect example of how to destroy your own political future by becoming a snobbish shrew through the power that is accompanied by the Governor's office.
Not only did she pronounce upon the incidents of the infamous New Year's Eve of Cologne, not only was she always reacting snitty and aggressively when she was posed a critical question by news media representatives, no, she also pulled a Ted Cruz; when the city of Münster was hit by disastrous floods in 2014, which claimed two lives, she refused to cut short her vacation. Later she claimed she was tarrying within a dead zone during her stay in Brandenburg, plus she couldn't have thwarted the flooding even if she had returned ahead of schedule...  

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Polls for the March 14 Baden-Württemberg state election:



Hypothetical direct gubernatorial election:



Favorability of possible coalitions:

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Polls for the March 14 Rhineland-Palatinate state election:



Hypothetical direct gubernatorial election:



Favorability of possible coalitions:

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Here's another interesting poll regarding either election:



In both cases, the majority of eligible voters are not yet sure about their eventual vote decision.

Furthermore, if I take a look at the favorability of possible coalitions in either election, the FDP seems to have lost their expertise and credibility. Even in Rhineland-Palatinate, the eligible voters seem to get rid of the current Ampel coalition encompassing SPD, Grüne and FDP.

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Btw, Thuringia goes to the polls in September in all likelihood and the current chaotic situation with the R2G minority government reluctantly being supported by CDU is just getting worse, as a new Infratest poll shows (result in 2019 in brackets):

Wait! Hasn't that already officially been decided and pronounced yet?

Here's the schedule for the upcoming state elections:

• March 14: Baden-Württemberg + Rhineland-Palatinate
• April 25: Thuringia (snap election) (postponed until Federal Election Day)
• June 6: Saxony-Anhalt
• September 26: Federal Election + Mecklenburg-Vorpommern + Thuringia (snap election) + Berlin¹⁾

1) The date for the Berlin state election has not officially been announced yet, though. If the expected election date does hold true, it will mark only the second time after Reunification that both the Bundestag and the Berlin Abgeordnetenhaus are to be elected on the same day.

Actually, that's a good idea - not only because they save money in terms of the election procedure owing to synergistic effects.
Furthermore, Thuringia always used to hold its state elections in autumn/fall. I don't like the idea of changing the season during which an election is usually held due to the occurrence of a snap election.
Something similar happened in Hesse, when the state government suddenly changed the "election season" in 2013, effectively ending the state government's legislative period ahead of schedule because they wanted to hold the state election contemporaneously with the federal election. 😒

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Btw, Thuringia goes to the polls in September in all likelihood and the current chaotic situation with the R2G minority government reluctantly being supported by CDU is just getting worse, as a new Infratest poll shows (result in 2019 in brackets):

Left: 29 % (31.0 %)
AfD: 23 % (23.4 %)
CDU: 22 % (21.7 %)
SPD: 10 % (8.2 %)
FDP: 6 % (5.0 %)
Greens: 5 % (5.2 %)

Not only the numbers for the Left Party have been shrinking more and more, the same goes for Governor Ramelow's numbers; he is still leading by huge margins, but they have also steadily been shrinking, and for the first time, a majority of Thuringians doesn't want him as their head of government anymore. 🤗

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The AfD seems pretty strong in BW by West German standards (if I recall correctly they got about 15% here in 2016, although that was at the peak of the migrant crisis) - any particular reason for that, such as disgruntled CDU/FDP conservatives?

BW always had a base for right-wing populists that either didn't turn out or voted CDU most likely. The Republicans managed to get into the Landtag in 1992 and 1996 with 9-10 %, and the NPD received almost 10 % in 1968. I guess the CDU also was quite right wing, considering that they had former Nazis like Kiesinger or Filbinger serving as Minister-Presidents.

Don't disregard the fact that the vast majority of Swabian Greens are esoteric, spiritual globule gobblers, staunch anti-vaxxers and believers in homeopathy, breatharianism and "Germanic medicine". Nowhere in the whole of Germany are AfD voters as similar to Greenservatives as in Swabia. I wouldn't even be surprise if we experience a green-blue coalition one day. (Ironically, in basically all cultures these two colors used to be perceived as the same; in Japan, they even "invented" the color green only some decades ago in order to keep up with the Western world.)
My going-out-on-a-limb theory is that this is the aftermath of the Tambora eruption...

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The Minister-President Bodo Ramelow is a member of the Left Party, so it's basically being former East Germany + incumbency bonus. He is relatively moderate though and often perceived as a de facto Social Democrat.

That doesn't explain, though, how Linke + AfD became the two strongest parties in the last state election. 🤷🏻‍♂️

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Why are the free voters big in Bavaria but no where else and is it possible for them to be in federal politics???

That's wrong! In the latest two Brandenburg state elections they each won a direct seat - in two different constituencies.
In Rhineland-Palatinate, they are poised to enter the Landtag this weekend.
In Baden-Württemberg, they are very influential on the community level.

The Free Voters began to make their breakthrough in 2007, when Edmund Stoiber refused to step down as Bavarian Governor and as CSU party chair.
Fürth County Commissioner and Latex fetishist Gabriele Pauli as a consequence organized some massive grassroot support, which initially came to nothing. Only after a whole regiment of party members leaving the CSU and joining the Free Voters, which had already been an important figure on the community level, Stoiber chose to renounce a further candidacy for either office.

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And on this note, is AfD in power anywhere? Even as a junior coalition member in some rural village in the middle of nowhere?

I must imagine that there must be at least some rural village with 400 people where they vote for an AfD guy for mayor because in those kinds of super small villages party affiliation doesn't really matter. (indeed, Vox here held 3 elected mayors in 2015 and a fourth who switched parties; and this was when they polled at 0.2% nationally!)

In the 900-inhabitant village of Frankenstein (yes, that's really its name!) in Rhineland-Palatinate, the only (!) CDU member of the municipal council, Monika Schirdewahn, and her husband, the only AfD member of that council, formed a caucus called "Fortschritt Frankenstein" back in 2019, but she was immediately expelled from her party.

In Luther City Eisleben in Saxony-Anhalt, the CDU formed a coalition with the AfD. After a news magazine discovered that Martin Ahrendt of the AfD faction was a convicted Neonazi, who regularly shares right-wig extremist content on Facebook, the CDU cancelled the cooperation.

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The CDU MV nominated their gubernatorial candidate on Saturday: Michael Sack. This personnel matter isn't a pivotal nomination whatsoever, but I find his political background quite interesting: Sack is not only the state chair of the CDU MV, he is also the county commissioner of Vorpommern-Greifswald County. I mean how many chancellors and minister presidents have been county commissioner before? Does anybody know an American president or governor who had held such a post before their big career began?

It's moreover interesting that Steve Urkel's white twin brother Philipp Amthor, who has been selected as the top candidate of the party's list for the federal election at the state convention, comes from the same county as Michael Sack. Vorpommern-Greifswald County is the stronghold of the AfD within Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, where it became the second-strongest party in in 2016; that county encompasses all constituencies the AfD won in that state election.

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They got 12.6% of the vote. Four years ago. They currently poll between 9.0% and 11.0%. In addition, their last state election results were pretty bad (they almost missed the electoral threshold in Hamburg).

You could as well have written that the AfD is only one of two parties (if you consider the Union one party: three), in the near future maybe even the only party, that is represented in each and every state parliament, that even managed to get re-elected into the Bürgerschaften of states where the Antifa controls all four divisions of power.

It is by far the most toxic party in Germany's post-war history (with the exception of the NPD perhaps). [...]Edit: I fully agree with what Old Europe has written on the 'bloc question'. There are literally zero similarities between a socially liberal but fiscally conservative party like the FDP (which is not right-wing!) and the quasi-socialist neo-nazis of the AfD. Zero.

That blatantly wrong. The FDP is clearly right-wing; the party even deems itself to be right-wing; that's why they sit to the right of the Union in the Bundestag. The FDP is de facto the successor party to the NSDAP as measured by the number of its former NSDAP members, which is why the Allies even wanted to prohibit the FDP initially. I find it also interesting that your Antifa sometimes deems their foes from the FDP to be neoliberal, and sometimes "quasi-socialist", depending on the suitableness for your "argumentation"...
Moreover, the AfD isn't nearly as right-wing as the CDU, CSU an FDP of 2000.

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I appreciate the responses from the German posters in this thread (and its sister). I guess I am just going to have to agree to disagree

Tbh it doesn't help that I have a big allergy to grand coalitions other than in very limited circumstances since they kill the junior partner (which happened to be the SPD in Germany) and make extreme parties increase; as well as for some reason me perhaps wrongly seeing the rise of Grüne at least partially as a symbol and clearest example of everything wrong with the modern (European) left (losing working class voters in favour of wealthy bourgeoise voters in cities and hipstery youths).

The SPD also kills the CDU on the other hand, if the Christian Democrats act as their junior partner, as it happened in Brandenburg and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern.

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It's interesting that you cite a person who was eaten eaten alive by the Thierse wing of decency of her same party and who was even called incompetent by Willy Brandt's eldest son.
I would also like to tear apart, but you already said multiple time that you are not interested in facts and reliable sources, just like every extremist. Your posts are full of false information and alternative facts, which you do on purpose, and thus it's impossible to argue with you. (And you comrade Hash would mutilate my reply, anyway.)
Someone who reasons themselves, against common knowledge, into thinking that the FDP weren't a right-wing party and that the CDU'S and FDP's of the early 2000's had been left-wing can't be a serious interlocutor for a political discourse. You just tried persuade yourself of those alternative facts you've been spreading only to justify your screwy and awry world view. If you only tarry in Holger's and meanwhile also Dave forum where you are surrounded by fellow travelers who applaude you for every lie you spread, you'll start to belive yur lies someday...

I also read your comments about Nick Hein, the archfoe of the Antifa for two reasons, in Holger's forum, and I absolutely condemn them, just like I deeply condemn your misogynic, anti-Semitic, homophobic, transphobic, pedophilia-glorifying and violence-glorifying remarks on either forum.

And also:

Fun fact: I'm gay myself Try again.

You're 100% straight of course. That's merely one of your numerous Paulaner Geschichten you excogitated in order to mud your own reality. You just pretended to be gay in order to justify the violence Utlu face from your Migrantifa, thanks to which he is being under police surveillance. Even if you were gay, your homophobic and anti-Semitic stances wouldn't be representative of the gay community whatsoever.

Altas used to be known for its high-quality posts - until you came and dragged it down QAnon-style.

But getting political ideologies right is simply not your strength I guess.

This user is on my ignore list since he started to derail threads in German because some people criticized him for hating Muslims (while calling himself "left-wing"). You have good points, but this poster is absolutely delusional so it probably won't matter.

That's simply slander. I never said I hated Muslims. i only said that Islam is a right-wing ideology and that a plethora (I didn't even say majority) of Muslims living in Europe hold right-wing extremist views and commit disproportionately crimes. And that's just a fact.
What makes your slander against me so disgusting is the fact that there are some Muslims around here, who are very fine and decent people and who have nothing in common with the criminal, terroristic Migrantifa in Europe, and by claiming I hated Muslims in general you intended to set those members against me. And to make it clear, there are also very decent, integrated in Europe, who oppose the criminal acts of their brethren, but those Muslims are threatened, attacked, and even murdered by the Migrantifa, and the Phone-up-picker already confessed that he approves of the violent atroctities against Muslimes who criticze Islam and right-ing Muslims.

I'm glad that this week's quarrel within the SPD, which the decent Thierse wing has clearly sewn up, proved once again that your woke Antifa wing is an absolutely immaterial minority within your party. You must learn that most left-wingers are not left-wing extremists.
My left-wing political views are clearly mainstream, not only within society, but also within the SPD.

There are no globalists running Germany. And I wish there were.

Interesting ... You don't consider the FDP to be right-wing because they are not neoliberal enough for you. I was never aware of the overlap between your Antifa and Neolibs: Globalism. That's why you glorify the FDP so much.

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Could the free voter enter federal politics???

Not this year, but if they manage to join the state parlament of Rhineland-Palatinate, this could be the start of them entering more state parlaments; they've already got stronger in many states. Then they would not be a Bavaria-only phenomenon. If they succeed in RLP, what I doubt at the moment, this could be a signal to voters in states like Hesse, Saxony, ..., that they can make the 5% threshold.
If they manage to get into enough state parlaments in the next 5 years, I could see them entering the Bundestag in 2026, but that is a big IF.

Aren’t they in another parliament outside of Bavaria? And what are the free voter politician centre left or right?

Yes, in Brandenburg (by winning a direct mandate) and in Saxony-Anhalt (by switching parties).

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Yes, in Brandenburg (by winning a direct mandate) and in Saxony-Anhalt (by switching parties).
BVB/FW actually managed both in the last state elections: They won a district (availing them to enter Parliament via Grundmandatsklausel), but they also took the 5 percent threshold narrowly.

What should be noted: BVB/Freie Wähler is not part of the federal umbrella group called Bundesvereinigung Freie Wähler, which the Free Voters in Bavaria and Saxony-Anhalt belong to.

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Btw, before it falls under the radar: Not only the state parliaments of RLP and BW are up for election tomorrow, but there are also local elections in Hesse.

In 2016, the SPD fell against the CDU by a mere 0.4%. I guess that was the SPD's last gasp of relief before its final falling into decline.
The AfD became the third-strongest party, narrowly beating the Greens.

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In the unlikely case that it did add up to a majority, GRUNE-FDP would be the first coalition without one of the 2 main parties of Germany right? (SPD and CDU/CSU)

I believe so, yes. And, in German fashion, it already has a name: Limetten-koalition.

The coalition between CSU and Free Voters is called papaya coalition, btw.

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FGW exit polls:

BW:

Greens: 31.5
CDU: 23
AfD: 12.5
SPD: 10.5
FDP: 11
Left: 3.5
FW: 3

SPD on the 5th place. That's a new all-time low...

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Traffic light is almost safe in RLP, another theoretical options is SPD-Greens-FW (red-green-orange...  idk what flag that would be? Burkina Faso?).

Disaster for the CDU.

I would call that a pepper coalition.

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SPD: Mixed. They definitely benefitted of Dreyer's incumbency in RLP. The result in BW is pretty bad tho, and there is a real possibility of the SPD becoming the smallest party in the Landtag there.

That BW result isn't a good reflection on Eskja's character and competence.

The clear winner of this evening ought to be Markus Söder...

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Just like in Hamburg: Retirees have saved the SPD.

52% of all SPD voters voted for their party due to Governor Malu Dreyer.

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AfD currently thrid-strongest party (11.8%) in BW according to the latest Hochrechnung by ARD.
SPD: 11.7%
FDP: 11.3%

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So in RLP it seems that the vote share for "Others" (without including Die Linke or FW) has more than doubled (!). Any idea who's benefiting from this?

I'd guess DIE PARTEI and Volt.