🇩🇪 German elections (federal & EU level)

[Astatine]

Also: In 297 (Saarlouis), in a rematch of 2017, we have a battle of ministers: Altmaier vs. Maas. In 2017, Altmaier won this race by 6. Applying uniform swing, Maas would end up as the winner this time. Not quite as exciting as the Wahlkreis 61 (Potsdam), which is Scholz vs. Baerbock, but still an interesting fact. Also, this shows how overrepresented the small Saarland is in the cabinet.

In fact, at some point it looked like Potsdam could become the most overrepresented district in whole Germany after this election.

The CDU candidate is Saskia Ludwig, a quite controversial right-winger who lost the seat in 2017 to the SPD (but is currently both in Bundestag and Landtag thanks to a list spot). Besides Scholz and Baerbock, former FDP General Secretary Linda Teuteberg and Linke Bundestag Member Norbert Müller are running as candidates.

Now, around March/April, Müller was seen as likely Linke Spitzenkandidat for the Brandenburg list, Teuteberg would get into the Bundestag anyway thanks to being Spitzenkandidatin for Brandenburg, same with Baerbock and Scholz, who might have split votes between them evenly leading to Ludwig winning the seat (some estimates had her winning at that point).

In April, Müller was not placed on the Linke list, and Scholz seems to be the likely winner of this district, while Ludwig's candidacy is hopeless (#7 on the list).

Btw, one district to look at is Christian Lindner's district Rheinisch-Bergischer Kreis. It is typically dark-black territory, but considering that he has some personal appeal (his district vote was almost tied with the proportional vote in 2017, unusual for FDP politicians) and the CDU's dramatic collapse, there is a non-zero chance that this district would be the first one to be won by FDP since 1990. Wahlkreisprognose (dubious methodology) saw him as probable winner at some point, and election.de which is more conservative about its district ratings still has this district as the only one where FDP has an outsider shot of winning it directly.

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

Super good ad from the SPD, will translate after work

[Jackson Lee]

Super good ad from the SPD, will translate after work

No need to translate the ad.

You can click on subtitles, then German, then automatically translate and choose English.

And yes, it’s indeed a very good ad.

Incredible how a party that was seen as incompetent a year ago is now back and about to win the election.

[Jackson Lee]

Absolutely stunning results from a new Mecklenburg poll for NDR.

SPD gains 14% compared to 2017, CDU falls by an identical amount.

https://www.wahlrecht.de/umfragen/laender.htm#mv

[President Johnson]

Super good ad from the SPD, will translate after work

Yeah, a very powerful ad. Hopefully they run this up and down.

There's also a new poll with another tie at 23%:

https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1430840913966796808

[Astatine]

Laschet faces another problem: Nobody wants to see him or campaign for him.

Several local newspapers in whole Germany have already noted that there are hardly any Laschet posters around in many towns - Just posters for the local candidates. When he became Chancellor candidate, there were some "announcements" by local activists to refuse campaigning for him, but those threats seem to become reality.

I myself have not seen one single Laschet poster in my district, and even the Green party which only files direct candidates without a list has some posters over here.
What an utter embarrassment for a Chancellor candidate.

There will be a debate between Laschet, Baerbock and Scholz on Sunday, we'll see how that ends. But considering he tries to avoid media spotlight as much as possible to not make another gaffe, I feel he's gonna perform badly.

[Astatine]

https://twitter.com/Wahlen_DE/status/1431135552951267331

Just lol, ik it's YouGov, but Lindner ahead of Baerbock and Laschet in a hypothetical Chancellor matchup is just... hilarious?

[President Johnson]

So. much. winning. Genosse Olaf is crushing it.





https://twitter.com/EuropeElects/status/1431169398224695298

[RGM2609]

CDU must have reached its floor with these numbers in the low 20s, right?

[Astatine]

CDU must have reached its floor with these numbers in the low 20s, right?

INSA also publishes numbers on minimum and maximal potentials of parties, and according to their most recent poll (08/23), the absolute floor of CDU/CSU is 17 % who are definitely committed to voting for them. On the other hand, 41 % could imagine themselves voting for the Christian Democrats in general and this number has been fluctuating between 35 and 50 % over the last four years, which really shows that most Germans don't necessarily dislike CDU/CSU as a party but only the candidate.

When Merkel was polling badly around October 2018 before announcing her intention to retire and CDU/CSU's potential maximum was at 37.5 %, the Christian Democrats were still constantly polling above 25 %. Heck, even with gaffe-prone AKK CDU/CSU was never polling below 24 %.

[SInNYC]

Is there any chance of AFD being part of a coalition? I read a couple of years back about some CDUers willing to include them in a coalition (at a local level).

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

Is there any chance of AFD being part of a coalition? I read a couple of years back about some CDUers willing to include them in a coalition (at a local level).

No, they are an unbelievably toxic party, and have only gotten even more so over the past few years. Germans in particular have bigger hang ups over inclusion of extremist parties in government than most other Europeans, for obvious reasons.

Most of my German friends thus far are FDP voters, and they abhor AfD. I know of just four CDU supporters, and three of them openly hate the party as well. Of course, my friend group is not representative, but even here on Atlas we have a few super conservative German posters who also hate the AfD.

[DL]

Do we know much about the political pedigree of AFD voters? Who did most of them vote for before the AFD existed? are they people who used to be CDU voters or are they more ex-SPD or even ex-Linke voters?

[Astatine]

Do we know much about the political pedigree of AFD voters? Who did most of them vote for before the AFD existed? are they people who used to be CDU voters or are they more ex-SPD or even ex-Linke voters?

Mostly a mix of a lot of non-voters, a lot of CDU voters, some SPD voters, some Linke voters and some FDP voters (the party was close to death when AfD ran for the first time and entered Parliament at the same as the AfD, therefore it is a bit tricky to track who really switched from FDP affiliation to AfD). There is virtually no exchange from Greens to AfD. AfD is also strong in areas in which far-right extremist parties (NPD, Republicans, DVU) had some residual strength and sucked up most of their electorate - where it existed.

[Amanda Huggenkiss]

Do we know much about the political pedigree of AFD voters? Who did most of them vote for before the AFD existed? are they people who used to be CDU voters or are they more ex-SPD or even ex-Linke voters?

Yes to all three of your assumptions, this is from an exit poll in 2017.


https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article168989573/Welche-Parteien-die-meisten-Stimmen-an-die-AfD-verloren.html

Nichtwähler = non-voters
Sonstige = others (I assume a good deal of NPD voters fall into this category)

[Yeahsayyeah]

Sonstige is probably mostly NPD here which lost almost 500000 votes between 2013 and 2017 and a good chunk of 2013 Pirate Party voters (they clearly had a protest vote segment), some fluctuation with the Free Voters and sucking up other right wing parties like the Republicans, although they were already miniscule in 2013.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

I think some people confuse the blockade around the AfD as a self imposed challenge by CDU politicians, while it's more that the CDU base really despise the AfD and tend to react very badly when politicians broach the subject. In a decade or so, if the AfD is still around and both parties have been through generational turnover, things might be different (similar to how Linke has slowly been redeemed for alliances with SPD and Greens, even as its brand of generational turnover is also leading to the party's slow death).

[Amanda Huggenkiss]

I think some people confuse the blockade around the AfD as a self imposed challenge by CDU politicians, while it's more that the CDU base really despise the AfD and tend to react very badly when politicians broach the subject. In a decade or so, if the AfD is still around and both parties have been through generational turnover, things might be different (similar to how Linke has slowly been redeemed for alliances with SPD and Greens, even as its brand of generational turnover is also leading to the party's slow death).

Indeed. We should not forget that there is an outright hatred for the AfD among German voters. I've seen a poll in which 70% of voters state that they think that the AfD might be unconstitutional. In a recent poll, 70% of voters stated that they would never, in any case, vote for the AfD. As you said, it might be a generational thing, but given that the AfD shows no efforts to moderate--the developments since 2015 display quite the contrary--it will take a long time to reach when cooperating with the AfD would not necessarily have negative effects on the opinion of voters.

[Vaccinated Russian Bear]

https://twitter.com/Wahlen_DE/status/1431710501348814857

It's happening. Though, can the debate tomorrow change it?

[Boobs]

I guess the question is if a good Scholtz performance actually changes the calculus on government formation. Say the SPD surges after a good performance and is at around 28-30% - wouldn’t most of their support come from squishy Greens? Union must already be pretty close to their floor, doubtful they have that much soft support left to bleed.

[Amanda Huggenkiss]

I guess the question is if a good Scholtz performance actually changes the calculus on government formation. Say the SPD surges after a good performance and is at around 28-30% - wouldn’t most of their support come from squishy Greens? Union must already be pretty close to their floor, doubtful they have that much soft support left to bleed.

In a recent INSA poll, the Union's floor was 17% (those voters stated that they were absolutely certain to vote CDU/CSU). So there is some wiggle room left, but you're right- the polls show the Union almost reduced to its core. The Greens meanwhile have a floor of 10%. So if the SPD was to gain another 5-6%--which is absolutely possible, since, according to that poll, there is an approximate potential of 45% for the SPD ('Which party could you in principle envision voting for?'), it is possible that they would gain more from the Greens than from the Union (or the FDP).

Changing the calculus within a coalition is important since it is conventional wisdom that the stronger the party is, the more government ministers they get. Also--while it is technically irrelevant whether a party comes first and by what margin--it somewhat grants more legitimacy to form a government. Say, the SPD comes first handidly, I think it would be unlikely to see a Jamaica coalition being formed, even if arithmetically possible. They call this Regierungsauftrag (mandate to govern). It is not like in the UK or in other countries where the monarch or the president gives the leader of the most successful party the order to form a government, but there is some kind of convention that coming first in an election with a comfortable margin means having the Regierungsauftrag. This is not the case if there is a clear majority against the party coming in first (e.g. the elections in 1976 and 1980), but we don't have that this time.

[Astatine]

I guess the question is if a good Scholtz performance actually changes the calculus on government formation. Say the SPD surges after a good performance and is at around 28-30% - wouldn’t most of their support come from squishy Greens? Union must already be pretty close to their floor, doubtful they have that much soft support left to bleed.

Probably, but it would give them a clear mandate to govern. It should also be noted that thanks to a complicated seat calculation system, the Union could still narrowly become largest parliamentary group if both parties are almost tied. The system of overhang and compensatory seats (party gets more districts than seats it should have, also based on federal states...) was somewhat reformed to avoid a Parliament that increases too much in size... But I haven't met one single person that could really explain now at which point an overhang seats does get compensated or not. And I know many political nerds.

Also, a stronger SPD might be a favor for the Liberals and ultimately a traffic light coalition, as they would have to concede less to two center-left parties in a three way coalition (although Jamaica would still be the FDP's preferred option). The FDP is vying for the office of Finance Minister... but as 3rd largest party, it would be difficult to demand that. If the Greens fall to be roughly even with the FDP, FDP's chances to get that Ministry are somewhat higher.

I guess CDU/CSU's definite floor is ~15 %. Their campaign is in full disarray, nobody knows what the party stands for and even less people want Laschet as Chancellor.

[President Johnson]

I guess the question is if a good Scholtz performance actually changes the calculus on government formation. Say the SPD surges after a good performance and is at around 28-30% - wouldn’t most of their support come from squishy Greens? Union must already be pretty close to their floor, doubtful they have that much soft support left to bleed.

Probably, but it would give them a clear mandate to govern. It should also be noted that thanks to a complicated seat calculation system, the Union could still narrowly become largest parliamentary group if both parties are almost tied. The system of overhang and compensatory seats (party gets more districts than seats it should have, also based on federal states...) was somewhat reformed to avoid a Parliament that increases too much in size... But I haven't met one single person that could really explain now at which point an overhang seats does get compensated or not. And I know many political nerds.

Also, a stronger SPD might be a favor for the Liberals and ultimately a traffic light coalition, as they would have to concede less to two center-left parties in a three way coalition (although Jamaica would still be the FDP's preferred option). The FDP is vying for the office of Finance Minister... but as 3rd largest party, it would be difficult to demand that. If the Greens fall to be roughly even with the FDP, FDP's chances to get that Ministry are somewhat higher.

I guess CDU/CSU's definite floor is ~15 %. Their campaign is in full disarray, nobody knows what the party stands for and even less people want Laschet as Chancellor.

I think Lindner has a good chance to become Finance Minister in a trafficlight coalition, even if the Greens end up having more votes. Both the SPD and Greens would have to make concessions because they both would obviously prefer Trafficlight to Jamaica or Germany coalition. Green co-leader Robert Habeck is said to have ambitions for the post, but he could easily become head of an "upgraded" Environment Ministry while Baerbock is vice chancellor and foreign minister (good riddance Heiko Maas, he was a poor choice for the job).

Assuming the SPD ends up between 21% and 26%, Greens between 14% and 19% and the FDP in the 10-13% range, I could see the following cabinet allocation:

- Chancellor: Olaf Scholz (SPD)
- Foreign/vice chancellor: Annalena Baerbock (Greens)
- Finance: Christian Lindner (FDP)
- Labor: SPD (keep Hubertus Heil please)
- Economy: FDP (Linda Teuteberg or Wolfgang Kubicki would be good)
- Environment and climate: Robert Habeck (Greens)
- Interior: SPD (please Boris Pistorius)
- Health: SPD (hopefully Karl Lauterbach)
- Justice: Greens (I'd like Cem Özedmir, before he hopefully replaces Kretschmann in a few years)
- Defense: SPD (former MdB Rainer Arnold would be a comptent choice)
- Digitalization (new): FDP
- Traffic: Greens
- Agriculture: Greens
- Family: SPD
- Education: SPD
- Economic Development: FDP
- Head of chancellery: SPD

I wonder whether Baerbock and Habeck would quit the party leadership then since the Greens have a rule to separate government and party posts. Maybe they change that? Baerbock and Habeck would still be de facto leaders.

Although I prefer trafficlight to red-red-green, it would be very important that these three parties have a parliamentary majority. In this case, the SPD and Greens would have a lot more leverage over the FDP because they could threaten a "left-leaning government" and Lindner feel compelled to seriously negotiate a SPD-Greens-FDP government to prevent a left-wing shift. Without a red-red-green majority, Lindner could insist on a Jamaica or Germany coalition, which wouldn't the in the best interest for both the SPD and the Greens. Especially if the SPD is the strongest party and Olaf fails to become chancellor. Laschet may be replaced by Söder then, as a SPIEGEL columnist recently wrote.

[Amanda Huggenkiss]

- Chancellor: Olaf Scholz (SPD)
- Foreign/vice chancellor: Annalena Baerbock (Greens)
- Finance: Christian Lindner (FDP)
- Labor: SPD (keep Hubertus Heil please)
- Economy: FDP (Linda Teuteberg or Wolfgang Kubicki would be good)
- Environment and climate: Robert Habeck (Greens)
- Interior: SPD (please Boris Pistorius)
- Health: SPD (hopefully Karl Lauterbach)
- Justice: Greens (I'd like Cem Özedmir, before he hopefully replaces Kretschmann in a few years)
- Defense: SPD (former MdB Rainer Arnold would be a comptent choice)
- Digitalization (new): FDP
- Traffic: Greens
- Agriculture: Greens
- Family: SPD
- Education: SPD
- Economic Development: FDP
- Head of chancellery: SPD

I would love to see Katarina Barley return to the cabinet, though it is quite unlikely. She always had genuine intentions. It's a pity that she was too nice to say no to Andrea Nahles when she asked her to be the lead candidate in the 2019 EU-elections. She easily could have become SPD-co leader if she was a bit more visible in federal politics. Being vice-president of the European parliament is pretty pointless, save for having a nice-sounding title. It's not easy to come back once you've made a bad trade to Brussels, but I wouldn't mind. She could also become Malu Dreyer's successor in RLP. Barley is popular in Trier.

[President Johnson]

- Chancellor: Olaf Scholz (SPD)
- Foreign/vice chancellor: Annalena Baerbock (Greens)
- Finance: Christian Lindner (FDP)
- Labor: SPD (keep Hubertus Heil please)
- Economy: FDP (Linda Teuteberg or Wolfgang Kubicki would be good)
- Environment and climate: Robert Habeck (Greens)
- Interior: SPD (please Boris Pistorius)
- Health: SPD (hopefully Karl Lauterbach)
- Justice: Greens (I'd like Cem Özedmir, before he hopefully replaces Kretschmann in a few years)
- Defense: SPD (former MdB Rainer Arnold would be a comptent choice)
- Digitalization (new): FDP
- Traffic: Greens
- Agriculture: Greens
- Family: SPD
- Education: SPD
- Economic Development: FDP
- Head of chancellery: SPD

I would love to see Katarina Barley return to the cabinet, though it is quite unlikely. She always had genuine intentions. It's a pity that she was too nice to say no to Andrea Nahles when she asked her to be the lead candidate in the 2019 EU-elections. She easily could have become SPD-co leader if she was a bit more visible in federal politics. Being vice-president of the European parliament is pretty pointless, save for having a nice-sounding title. It's not easy to come back once you've made a bad trade to Brussels, but I wouldn't mind. She could also become Malu Dreyer's successor in RLP. Barley is popular in Trier.

I agree, Barley is competent and likeable and I was kinda disappointed when she left the federal government in 2019. I just don't think she'll return to national politics. Would definitely be a better party leader than Saskia Esken despite the fact I've known the latter personally long before she ran for her current post (her mother still lives in my town; also remember her coming all the way from her district to a local Juso barbecue I organized here in 2016 as local Juso chairman). Esken however would be a competent choice for any government role related to digitalization as she's an expert on the issue. I still voted for Scholz in both rounds during the party leadership election and I'm glad she and NoWaBo have stayed out of the public spotlight in recent weeks and allow Scholz to be the party's public frontman.