🇩🇪 German state & local elections

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Yes, the legislative framework on the subject is the complete opposite to Britain, where the same rules apply to political parties as to private members clubs and the like: a party can write its own rules and apply its own practices and can blackball, suspend and expel people with impunity.

[jaichind]

BSW surge in Thuringia

https://twitter.com/Wahlen_DE/status/1747578462125138421

Anti Atlantist parties at 48

[Umengus]

BSW surge in Thuringia

https://twitter.com/Wahlen_DE/status/1747578462125138421

Anti Atlantist parties at 48

and anti-immigration

[palandio]

BSW surge in Thuringia

https://twitter.com/Wahlen_DE/status/1747578462125138421

Anti Atlantist parties at 48

The repective articles on the websites of the commissioning newspapers (all of them owned by Funke Medien) are behind a paywall, so I can't read them. But according to Tagesspiegel, which is generally known to be reliable, BSW was not explicitly mentioned as an option.

So we now have INSA which has BSW at 17% in Thuringia and 13% in Brandenburg and Forsa which as BSW at 4% in both Thuringia and Brandenburg (and below 3% nationally). This is an extreme difference.

One reason could be a difference in methodology. Forsa is using polling by phone, INSA is using an online panel.

But I can't help to think that at least one of these two pollsters has an agenda, probably both of them.

If Infratest dimap sticks to its bi-weekly interval, we'll get a national poll from them tomorrow. The method is usually a mix of both phone and online panel.

[jaichind]

AfD keeps its lead in Saxony despite BSW now also being polled.
https://twitter.com/Wahlrecht_de/status/1750412507695493165

[Yeahsayyeah]

I'm still sceptical that these Wagenknecht numbers will prevail as the party totally lacks organisation and members for now and as nobody knows what it really stands for everybody is projecting on it what he or she wants to project from "AfD light" over "centrist populism" to "traditional Left party done right".

With these numbers we are actually quite close to negative majority numbers, unless the BSW really goes into the "centrist populism" direction (as the Saxony CDU are Putin bootlickers themselves, they probably won't make too much fuzz about that.)

[Duke of York]

AfD keeps its lead in Saxony despite BSW now also being polled.
https://twitter.com/Wahlrecht_de/status/1750412507695493165

absolutely terrifying the Nazi party is leading the polls.

[jaichind]

AfD keeps its lead in Saxony despite BSW now also being polled.

absolutely terrifying the Nazi party is leading the polls.

Just to be clear.  AfD was the highest polling party in Saxony in the 2017 Federal and 2019 EU elections so their being number one here is not a big deal.  That they can be ahead by 5 with BSW on the ballot does show the strength of AfD.

[rob in cal]

FDP relegated to the others pile in the  Saxony poll.

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

The University of Potsdam has published a "BSW-O-Mat", where you can test your opinions against the party's first version of its manifesto: https://www.bswomat.de/

Note that the party still has to have its first convention and publish a platform, so this manifesto is not really a policy selection, but still indicative of direction.

You are given the choice to rate each statement between +5 and -5 to rate how much you agree or disagree.

Here are the statements:

1. Many people have lost trust in the state and no longer feel represented by any of the existing parties.

2. Immigration is only an enrichment as long as the influx remains limited to a level that does not overwhelm our country and its infrastructure, and as long as integration is actively promoted and succeeds.

3. Europe needs a stable security architecture, which in the longer term should also include Russia.

4. We fundamentally reject resolving conflicts using military means.

5. Migration is not the solution to the problem of poverty in our world. We need fair global economic relations and must strive for more prospects in our home countries.

6. Anyone who is politically persecuted in their home country is entitled to asylum.

7. NATO fuels feelings of threat and defensive reactions, thereby contributing to global instability.

8. Cancel culture, pressure to conform and the increasing narrowing of the spectrum of opinions are incompatible with the principles of a free society.

9. What is needed is a fair tax system that relieves the burden on low earners and prevents large corporations and very rich private individuals from avoiding their fair share of financing the community.

10. In order to prevent wage pressure, collective bargaining should be strengthened again and the general validity of collective agreements made easier.

11. The promise of upward mobility of the social market economy no longer applies; personal prosperity has long since become dependent primarily on the social status of one's parents.

12. Blind activism and ill-conceived measures do not help the climate, but they endanger our economic substance, make people's lives more expensive and undermine public acceptance of sensible climate protection measures.

13. Given today's technologies, Germany's energy supply cannot be secured through renewable energies alone.

14. Large companies that dominate the market, all-powerful financial corporations and overreaching digital monopolists impose their toll on all other market participants, undermine competition and destroy democracy.

15. Politics influenced and bought by corporations and the failure of antitrust authorities have created a market economy in which many markets no longer function.

16. For years, governments have ignored the wishes of the majority.

17. Instead of rewarding performance, Germany redistributed money from the hardworking to the top ten thousand.

18. Since Russia's sanctions and alleged climate policy suddenly made energy more expensive, our country is threatened with the loss of important industries and hundreds of thousands of well-paid jobs.

19. Instead of respecting freedom and diversity of opinion, an authoritarian political style is spreading that wants to tell citizens how they should live, heat, think and speak.

20. Instead of investing in a competent state and good public services, politicians have served the wishes of influential lobbies and thereby emptied public coffers.

21. To a considerable extent, current inflation is also the result of market failure caused by excessive economic power.

You can then either have your result calculated or respond to another six statements; if you answer them, these are the statements:

22. Germany needs a foreign trade policy that relies on stable trade relations with as many partners as possible instead of forming new blocs and excessive sanctions and that secures our supply of raw materials and cheap energy.


23. Our country deserves self-confident policies that focus on the well-being of its citizens and are based on the understanding that American interests differ significantly from our interests.

24. We reject the use of German soldiers in international wars as well as their stationing on the Russian border or in the South China Sea.

25. The privatization and commercialization of essential services, such as in the areas of health, care or housing, must be stopped; non-profit providers should have priority in these sectors.

26. Personal prosperity should not be a question of social background, but must be the result of hard work and individual effort.

27. Our country is not in good shape.

You can then choose to answer a huge slew of demographic questions, or just skip ahead.


My results were:

Overall agreement: 45%
Criticism of the establishment: 42%
Economic policy: 53%
Social policy: 75%
Freedom: 10%
Climate and energy: 55%
Immigration: 60%
Foreign policy: 16%

[S019]

https://www.mdr.de/nachrichten/sachsen/dresden/dresden-radebeul/werteunion-cdu-ministerpraesident-kretschmer-distanzierung-100~amp.html

The Werte Union, a right wing group within the CDU that is transitioning into its own party, has been excluded from government in Saxony following the 2024 elections later this year.

[President Johnson]

I also took the test with regard to Wagenknecht Party. Hardly a surprise these results:

Overall: 42%
Criticism of the Establishment: 35%
Economic policy: 47%
Social policy: 68%
Liberty: 30%
Climate and energy: 35%
Immigration: 77%
Foreign policy: 10%


@Clarko: Could you scale the image? That would make the page more readable.

[Yeahsayyeah]

So, basically with the BSW you get left wing welfare politics paired with performative "anti-wokeism", gutting every measure that tries to combat climate change, a centrist to centre-right migration policy, closer ties to Russia and an "economic vision" that mostly contains of platitudes and an every-should-stay-as-it-is-conservatism". The left wing distributional and welfare state policy is the only thing that has some appeal to me and everything else clearly contradicts my political beliefs.

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

The circus known as the Berlin SPD goes on; from April 6th to 19th, the 18,500 strong party membership will vote for a new state party chair duo, with vote counting on April 20th. If no pair of candidates receives an outright majority, a runoff election will be held in May between the two best-performing duos. The winning pair will then be formally elected at the state party conference on May 26th.

Three debate forums are scheduled: March 19th (in person), April 11th (in person), and April 16th (online).

We have three sets of candidates (remember that state leadership chairs are elected as duos, one man and one woman):

• The incumbent state party leader Raed Saleh finally announced his candidacy together with the district politician Luise Lehmann from Marzahn-Hellersdorf. Franziska Giffey, who was elected as leader of the Berlin SPD in November 2020 with Saleh, has said she will not stand for leadership after two poor election campaigns (many consider the 2021 campaign to be poorly handled, despite coming first in the election), but will instead focus on her current position as Vice-Mayor of Berlin with the Economic Affairs Senator portfolio. Saleh is seen as a "stay the course" candidate, while the 27-year old Lehmann is seen as rising star candidate with a background in healthcare policy. Saleh has held a leadership position for 12 years and has been state chairman for 4 years, is also the chairman of the SPD group in the state parliament, and has a long party career behind him and is seen as one of the levers of power in the party. They want to convince voters of the combination of experience plus change will strengthen democracy and promote social cohesion in the city again. They present themselves as the tried & tested, responsible middle ground between the left and right wings of the party. Saleh, coming from Spandau, and Lehmann, coming from Marzahn, also represent the extreme east and west ends of the city geographically.
• District chairman of SPD Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf, Kian Niroomand, is applying together with the chairwoman of "Women in the SPD", Jana Bertels. A duo in their mid-30s, they are considered to be on the left wing of the party, and were unanimously endorsed by the Jusos. They consider the Greens and Left parties to be the natural governing partners of the SPD. They want a real "new start" for the SPD Berlin, to make the SPD Berlin a “left-wing metropolitan party of the 21st century”, and want to develop social democratic solutions to the city's challenges with the help of a broad participation process among members and urban society. They regret the membership decision to join the government with the CDU in the aftermath of the 2023 election, and say it would have been better to sit in opposition at the time. They believe that the state SPD has become a top-down party over the past few years, and want to change this. They also propose an industrial strategy to increase the share of manufacturing in the city's economy. They are seen as friendly to the pro-expropriation movement for affordable housing, but have agreed to not make it an issue in the leadership election to prevent the election from becoming an internal party referendum on the matter.
• Neukölln’s district mayor Martin Hikel and former Secretary of State for Sport Nicola Böcker-Giannini were the first to announce their candidacies, and hail from the pragmatic-conservative wing of the party. Their pitch is that the SPD, at both the state and federal level, has become too distant from the SPD's core clientele of workers and labor. They claim that the party has forgotten how to discuss things, there is a lack of fair dealings with each other, and too many decisions are made in back rooms. They argue that the party leadership has inflamed ideological wars, and deliberately set "pragmatic" and "progressive" positions against each other, instead of seeking consensus and simply choosing the option that is best. The duo have criticized that given the tight fiscal situation in Berlin, the previous Red-Red-Green and current CDU-SPD governments have adopted "free for everyone" policies such as abolishing daycare fees and the 29 Euro ticket, and would like to see the well-off contribute more to achieve a "fair city" with "real distribution from top to bottom". Like the Saleh-Lehmann duo, they are supportive of the proposal to build housing on the former Tempelhofer Feld airport. They are the only duo that has emphasized that the SPD Berlin should be willing to form a coalition with all democratic parties (i.e. not the AfD), and that it is wrong to put the CDU on the same level as the völkisch AfD. An amusing fact about this duo is their height difference: at 2.08 meters, Hikel is known for immediately standing out in a crowd due to his enormous height, and he towers over his running mate, who, as you can guess from her Italian surname, is a bit on the shorter side.

All three duos have emphasized that they want less internal strife and more discussion between disparate factions, and want more inclusion of the membership and associated organizations. Of course, who they hold responsible varied greatly. While Saleh & Lehmann defend previous SPD-led projects such as the 29 Euro transit ticket, free schools meals for all, and free of charge daycare for all, the other two duos (from the left and the right) criticize these as opposed to the spirit of redistribution, but also with an eye to the tight fiscal situation in Berlin*. Meanwhile, the Saleh & Lehmann and Hikel & Böcker-Giannini tickets are aligned on wanting to build housing on Tempelhofer Feld and skepticism of the expropriation referendum.

So for my two cents: I think this vote will come down to the wire, and will probably be forced into a runoff election. And that runoff could see any combination of the duos. The above trio of duos is actually very representative of the disparate factions of the Berlin SPD, which I guess is something to commend.

However, I would be most worried if I were the Saleh & Lehmann duo. As the incumbent who has presided over two election disasters and a breakdown in the internal cohesion of the party, Saleh is the one being bombarded with criticism from all directions. He has, whether he is responsible or not, presided over some incredibly divisive decisions and events, and this makes very few people happy. There are actually some inside of the party itself who believe that his machinations are why the cohesion of the party has suffered, and some Giffey loyalists believe that he is partially responsible for spreading rumors and discord in an attempt to undermine her, but to be fair, none of this has been proven, and it may just be sour grapes from her camp. While the Saleh-Lehmann centrist course would usually be a strong one given the demographics of the SPD membership base, I feel that they are made vulnerable by the anchor that is an unpopular incumbency hanging around their necks.

The Jusos candidates I think have a solid chance, since the city's and party's demographics have changed and the decision to go into a coalition with the CDU was controversial. If they can get enough of the 46% of the membership who voted "no" last year to support them, they can make it to the runoff and then have a fighting chance at leadership. They also have a compelling message of renewal and reforming the party's structures to make it more responsive to the membership base. Given the scandals and power struggles, enough members may be willing to give them a shot. However, given that the party is still dominated by older voters, and the membership base of the Berlin SPD is considered to be conservative-leaning, they start out at a slight disadvantage. Furthermore, those older members are the ones who have the highest turnout, which skews the SPD electorate even more to the right.

Which then brings us to the Hikel-Böcker-Giannini team, who I feel fairly confident that they will make the runoff election and IMO stand the strongest chance of winning the contest. The Berlin SPD is stereotyped as being conservative-leaning, not quite as much other state parties, but still a bit more to the right. Hikel's long activism in the Neukölln district, and his mayorship since March 2018, also lend him major credibility in working in a troubled and difficult district with many social problems. They can successfully portray themselves as a new start and criticize the Saleh-Lehmann pair as "the incumbents who got us here" while also juxtaposing themselves against the RRG-friendly Niroomand-Bertels ticket as being "ideological". However, the angle that they could face vulnerability from is that Hikel is considered the ideological successor of Franziska Giffey (and he is literally her successor as Mayor of the district of Neukölln), who also has polarized approval ratings in the party. The Berlin SPD has also been controlled by the conservative wing of the party for most of the past 35 years, hence people may want an ideological change in the party and associate Hikel with Giffey.

But again: I expect the first round due on April 20th will be an extremely tight three-way race. I think the Saleh-Lehmann ticket will be weighed down by the previous four years of scandal, infighting, and poor election results, which then leads to a run off between the left and right-wings of the party, with the right-wing having an edge.

So we'll see...


_{*for context, the tax estimate for the upcoming 2024-2025 budget will be released at the end of May, and there are already fears that revenues will fall short of last year's projections and require painful spending cuts.}

[Clarko95 📚💰📈]

On mobile so this will be short:

Bertels-Niroomand = 36,11%
Hikel-Böcker-Giannini = 48,24%
Saleh-Lehmann = 15.65%

Runoff proceeds to be a left vs right showdown