The Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the party of German chancellor, Angela Merkel, received a bloody nose in regional elections held in two German states on Sunday.
In Rhineland-Palatinate the CDU saw its vote share fall by four percentage points, to 27.1%. The Social Democratic Party (SPD) emerged as the single biggest party in the state, with 35.7% of the vote. In the 101-seat state legislature they secured 39 seats while the CDU won 31, four down from the previous election. The Greens had a good day at the office, winning ten seats, up from six. Other parties to make it to the legislature were the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) which won 9 seats (down from 14 compared to the previous election), the liberal Free Democratic Party (FDP), which secured six, a loss of one compared to the previous election, and the Free Voters, with six seats, after having failed to win a seat in the previous state election.
The other election was held in Baden-Württemberg (which contains the important city of Stuttgart), where the Greens also had a good day. The environmentalist party held its position as the single biggest party, winning 32.6% of the vote, an increase of 2.3 percentage points compared to the previous election. This was enough to give it 58 seats in the 158-member regional parliament. The CDU saw its vote share fall below 25%, with 42 seats. The SPD managed 11% and 19 seats while the FDP saw its vote share grow by 2.2 percentage points, to 10.5%, giving it 18 seats in the legislature (up from 12). The AfD managed just shy of 10%, a loss of five percentage points, giving it 17 seats, a loss of six seats.
The results in the two states are the worst for the CDU in many years and could be due to the party’s botched handling of the Covid-19 pandemic. Although the government was praised for its initial handling of the crisis, it has now run into trouble. There have been problems with rolling out a vaccination programme. Germans are also suffering from lockdown fatigue, while two CDU members of the national parliament had to resign after they were found to have earned hundreds of thousands of euros in mask-procurement deals.
This is reflected in poll numbers, with the CDU’s national poll numbers (which include its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union) dropping from 40% to the low 30s. The Greens are currently on track to come second (polling at about 20%) with the SPD third.
Germans go to the polls in September. The election will be the first since 2005 for the CDU without Merkel, as she is planning to step down.
Photo by Christian Wiediger on Unsplash