Thuringia’s Social Democrats and Left-Right Symmetry: The Case Against Scholz’s First Grand Unified Government
A third state election follows Sept. 22 in another eastern state, Brandenburg, currently led by Scholz’s party. Germany will have a national election in a little over a year.
Thuringia’s politics are particularly complicated because the Left Party of outgoing governor Bodo Ramelow, who led a minority government, has slumped into electoral insignificance nationally. It has lost nearly half of its support over the last five years, dropping to around 12%.
Sahra Wagenknecht, long one of its best-known figures, left last year to form her own party, which is now outperforming the Left. Wagenknecht celebrated what she called an unprecedented success for a new party, underscored its refusal to work with Hcke and hoped that it can form a good government with the CDU.
Linnemann said that his party won’t work with the far right. He said that the voters in both states knew that they wouldn’t form coalitions with the anti-fascist group.
The nationalist party that blamed immigrants for most of Germany’s problems was founded 11 years ago, but has risen in popularity since the former Chancellor allowed more than a million migrants to resettle in Germany.
The left-winger party wants to tighten immigration into Germany and wants a solution to the war in Ukraine. The BSW’s strong showing is bad news for Germany’s social democrats, the party of Chancellor Olaf Scholz, which could see more left-leaning voters drawn away from the party.
Russia’s war inUkraine is a sensitive issue in the east. The second biggest weapons supplier to the United States is Berlin, and that it is something both the Afrikan D and the BSW are against. The German government and the US decided to deploy long-range missiles to Germany.
Scholz’s center-left Social Democrats were at least on course to remain in the two state legislatures with single-digit support, but the environmentalist Greens appeared set to lose their seats in Thuringia. The two parties were the junior coalition partners in both outgoing state governments. The third party in the national government, the Free Democrats, were set to lose their seats in Thuringia. It did not have a representation in the state.
Some of the factors that have caused support for populist parties in the region are discontent with a national government notorious for infighting, anti-immigration sentiment and skepticism toward German military aid for Ukrainians.
Projections for ARD and ZDF public television based on exit polls and partial counting showed Alternative for Germany winning 32-33% of the vote in Thuringia — well ahead of the center-right Christian Democratic Union, the main national opposition party, with about 24%.
The new party founded by a prominent Leftist made an immediate impact, while the Chancellor’s unpopular national government obtained weak results.
In neighboring Saxony, projections put support for the CDU — which has led the state since German reunification in 1990 — at 31.7%, with AfD on 30.6-31.4%.
“An openly right-wing extremist party has become the strongest force in a state parliament for the first time since 1949, and that causes many people very deep concern and fear,” said Omid Nouripour, a leader of the Greens, one of the national governing parties.
Alice Weidel, a national co- leader of the Alternative For Germany, said that the success was a historic one. She described the result as a “requiem” for Scholz’s coalition.
In anger about the immigration system in Germany, the Sahra Wageknecht Alliance vowed to win a majority of parliament in Thüringen
German voters are growing frustrated with a wave of migrants arriving in the country, particularly when the economy is stagnant.
Last week, three people were murdered and several others were injured by a Syrian man at a festival in the western German city of Solingen.
After the attack it was discovered that a man was supposed to have been deported months ago, and it led to increased anger about Germany’s immigration system.
Still, the nationalist, Russia-friendly party could end up with enough seats in both states to block decisions requiring a two-thirds vote, such as the appointment of judges and top security officials.
The Sahra Wageknecht Alliance (BSW), a party centered on a popular former communist party politician, won more than 15% of seats in Thüringen and more than 11% of seats in Saxony’s parliament, just eight months after the party was founded.