Germany’s AfD is so extreme it’s putting off other far-right parties – CNN
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Germany Elections
Germany: Merz government may use radical ‘federal coercion’ power if AfD party controls Saxony-Anhalt– rmx.news
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The anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) won the Saxony-Anhalt state election by a wide margin but fell short of an absolute majority. Nevertheless, the party may still come to power if it can garner enough support from BSW or peel off a few MPs from rival parties. This possibility has thrust an unused and radical clause of the German constitution, federal coercion or “Bundeszwang,” to the center of a fight over how far Berlin can go if the right-wing party takes power.
The AfD took 43.8 percent of the vote in the Sept. 6 election, but the AfD remains three seats short of an absolute majority. However, Ulrich Siegmund, the AfD’s 35-year-old lead candidate, could still become minister-president. The German government has plenty of tools for dealing with Siegmund if he steps out of line.
Germany’s establishment threatens to use “federal coercion” clause
Federal coercion is one of the most radical mechanisms in the German constitution. Article 37 allows the federal government or a representative it appoints to issue binding orders to the states and their agencies. The Federal Republic of Germany has never resorted to this clause before.
Anna-Bettina Kaiser, a law professor at Humboldt University in Berlin, told Deutsche Welle the bar is extremely high.
German think tanks urge Merz to stick with reforms after election defeats – France 24
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Germany ‘No Longer Safe’ for Jews, Chancellor Merz Says Following Defeat by Jew-Hating Left Party in Berlin– gellerreport.com
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Islam has infected the West with it’s rampant Jew hatred under the guise of ‘Palestinianism” which is nothing more than a marketing term for Islamic Jew hatred.
In 2026, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz concedes: “Jewish life in Germany is no longer safe.”
pic.twitter.com/XWMAjzxZLR— Arsen Ostrovsky (@Ostrov_A) September 21, 2026
Berlin has fallen (again) https://t.co/LkGtmJbPPj
— Eylon Levy (@EylonALevy) September 22, 2026
Germany ‘no longer safe’ for Jews, Merz says following defeat by Left Party in Berlin
“The fact that Jewish life in Germany is no longer safe is the most serious burden of recent years,” Merz stated in a press conference.
By J Post, September 22, 2026:
German Jews are no longer safe in the country, German Chancellor Friedrich Merz claimed on Monday, following his party’s recent defeat by the far-left Left Party in Berlin’s state election.
“The fact that Jewish life in Germany is no longer safe is the most serious burden of recent years,” Merz stated in a press conference.
The Left Party has faced multiple accusations of antisemitism in the past, including after a campaign event in August featured a rapper who chanted “Death to the IDF” and “Yalla yalla Intifada.”
The leader of the Left Party, 45-year-old Elif Eralp, has been compared to New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, particularly for her focus on social media and personal campaigning.
She has denied accusations of antisemitism, saying that “Celebrating violence and terrorism is absolutely unacceptable,” and “I will do everything to ensure that Jewish people – just like Muslims, queer people, and everyone in our city – can feel safe.”
An annual report by Germany’s independent antisemitism monitoring network RIAS revealed in June that antisemitic incidents hit an all-time high in Germany since monitoring began in 2025, with 8,725 recorded offenses.
Far-left, far-right score major victories in German state elections – The Jerusalem Post
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Merz’s party hits new low in regional election ‘disaster’ — RT World News– www.rt.com
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The chancellor’s CDU is on course for its worst-ever state showing in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and trails the Left in Berlin
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz described his Christian Democratic Union’s performance in Sunday’s state election in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Berlin as a “disaster,” after preliminary results showed a historic low for the party.
The CDU received just 5.5% of the vote, according to an ARD exit poll, its worst results in a state election since the founding of the federal republic in 1949. This leaves the party just above the 5% threshold required to enter the regional parliament.
“The result in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania cannot be talked away, it’s a disaster,” Merz acknowledged during a press conference on Sunday evening. However, he still defended his government’s course, insisting that there “cannot be a return to the good old times.”
The Alternative for Germany party (AfD) is leading with 37%, ahead of the ruling Social Democrats (SPD) at 35.5%, according to the poll.
Germany’s far-right AfD makes strong gains in two state elections– www.france24.com
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Germany‘s AfD party on Sunday was set to win 37% in the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, ahead of the centre-left Social Democrats (SPD) on 35.5% and far in front of Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s conservatives, who got 5.5% and barely crossed the threshold to enter the state parliament, according to exit polls on ARD public television.
But the far-right party is unlikely to govern as the other main parties rule out working with it.
In another election in the capital Berlin that also took place on Sunday, the far-left Linke party was on 24.5%, while Merz’s conservatives were on 20% and the AfD also gained in strength, hitting 16%.
Merz’s center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) is projected to fall to 5.5% in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, a largely rural state in Germany’s formerly communist east. That would be its worst result there since World War II.
In a televised address after the polls closed at 6pm local time, Merz said the election in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania was a “disaster” for his party and vowed to accelerate reforms as CDU party leader and chancellor to bring Germany forward.
“The reforms have to come,” he said. “I am taking on this responsibility, because I want to move our country forward.”
In Berlin, the CDU is projected to come in second with 20%, behind the Left party at 24.5%, according to the exit poll by public broadcaster ARD.
German state elections: Chancellor Friedrich Merz vows to stay on despite ‘disaster’ in polls– www.bbc.co.uk
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Embattled German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has vowed to stay on despite exit polls in two local elections suggesting damaging defeats for his centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party.
In the north-eastern state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, the party was initially projected to scrape through with its worst ever election result. But a few hours later, it dipped below the 5% threshold needed to stay in parliament. Merz called it “a disaster” for his party.
Meanwhile the far-right AfD was on track to win the most votes in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, but it is unlikely to govern as other parties refuse to work with it.
In Berlin, the ruling CDU was expected to be beaten by Die Linke (The Left).
Merz is under mounting pressure, with poor approval ratings and rumours he could even be replaced mid-term in a so-called chancellor swap.
Votes took place on Sunday, a fortnight after the CDU saw its vote halved as the Alternative for Germany (AfD) won a major victory in the state of Saxony-Anhalt.
AfD wins Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania as Berlin swings left – euractiv.com
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German chancellor Merz vows to stay in office amid ‘disaster’ after double election blow with far-left AND far-right win– www.thesun.co.uk
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GERMANY’s chancellor has vowed to stay in office – despite describing the elections as as a “disaster” for his party.
Friedrich Merz, leader of Christian Democratic Union (CDU), responded to the projected losses in two state elections to both far-left and far-right parties.
Merz said: “Trust in our country’s institutions is waning and is being actively undermined by radical parties on both the left and the right.”
In the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, preliminary results indicated that the CDU would just about creep over the 5 per cent threshold to enter the state’s parliament.
German chancellor stands his ground after his party loses in state elections – NPR
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The only pro-German political party in Germany, the AfD, won 44% of the vote in a Saxony-Anhalt state election. The party fell just short of a majority for the state government, having captured 39 of the 83 seats in the State assembly. They fell just three seats short of a majority. The response from the “Planvasion of Germany” parties was to call for the AfD to be banned.
‘Shockwave’: Germany’s AfD Party Wins Big in Key State Election– legalinsurrection.com
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Despite a massive nationwide media and political campaign, the Alternative for Germany (AfD) secured a stunning election victory in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt. The right-wing party won 44% of the vote and captured 39 seats in the 83-seat state assembly — leaving it just three seats short of an absolute majority.
With today’s result, the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt could form a government in coalition with the leftist anti-establishment BSW party. A breakaway faction from the far-left Linke party, the BSW secured just over 5%. “One idea being floated is whether there could be informal deal whereby a small party – the BSW – could give their tacit support to allow the AfD to form a minority government,” the BBC noted.
Germany’s ruling Christian Democrats (CDU), who formerly governed the state, came second with a little over 17%. Germany’s Chancellor and CDU chief Friedrich Merz conceded the “most severe election defeat” in “years, or decades,” to quote his own words. “This election result is sending shockwaves,” Merz confessed.
Not just for Chancellor Merz, the outcome is a big setback for Germany’s left-wing establishment. According to the German newspaper Die Welt, the election result showed that the old political establishment is now in “self-destruct” mode. “The political culture of the Berlin Republic is coming to an end. The election outcome, disastrous for the country’s elites, reveals just how detached they have become from reality,” the country’s most-read newspaper commented.
Merz Cancels Trump Call After Trump Hails AfD Victory and Slams Germany’s Globalist Mass Migration Policy * The Gateway Pundit * by Robert Semonsen– www.thegatewaypundit.com
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EXCERPT:
Germany’s left-liberal, globalist Chancellor Friedrich Merz has postponed a planned telephone conversation with the US President Donald Trump on Wednesday, days after voters in Saxony-Anhalt handed the AfD a sweeping regional election victory and a major defeat to Merz’s CDU.
The German government offered no explanation for pulling the call, the German press reported. Government spokesman Stefan Kornelius said Berlin had requested the postponement and that officials hadn’t yet settled on another date.
Asked whether an ordinary scheduling conflict caused the change, Kornelius indicated that it wasn’t the issue. The unanswered questions quickly turned attention toward Trump’s public celebration of the AfD’s election result.
Trump had weighed in after the AfD stormed into first place in Saxony-Anhalt. Writing on Truth Social, he described the result as a “really big night” for Germany’s populist movement and linked its rise directly to public frustration over immigration.
President Trump on AfD pic.twitter.com/c1VuUSNlCJ
— Open Source Intel (@Osint613) September 8, 2026
The president said Germans had grown tired of immigration rules that, in his assessment, had inflicted serious damage on the country. He ended the message with “MGGA,” an apparent German variation of his “Make America Great Again” slogan.
Merz’s spokesman refrained from saying whether those remarks prompted Wednesday’s decision. Instead, Kornelius pointed to the chancellor’s previous position that foreign governments shouldn’t intervene in or comment on Germany’s domestic politics, particularly elections.
The diplomatic friction arrived at an especially difficult moment for Merz. His CDU suffered a devastating setback in Sunday’s Saxony-Anhalt election as the AfD more than doubled its previous share of the vote.
Official results put the AfD at 43.8%, while the CDU collapsed to 17.2%. The AfD secured 39 seats in the 83-member state parliament, leaving it only three seats short of an outright majority.
The scale of the result transformed what had been a regional contest into a national political problem for Merz. His party had governed Saxony-Anhalt for more than two decades, but voters delivered the CDU one of its most punishing defeats there.
AfD candidate Ulrich Siegmund said the result demonstrated that voters wanted fundamental change. He campaigned heavily on immigration and promised deportations of people residing illegally in Germany from the beginning of an AfD administration.
Migration wasn’t the election’s only issue. Germany’s exceedingly sluggish economy, dissatisfaction with the federal government and concerns about living standards also helped shape the vote, according to election analyses.
Still, immigration has become one of the sharpest dividing lines in German politics. The AfD advocates substantially tighter border and migration policies, while Trump has repeatedly argued that Germany and other European countries allowed immigration to reach damaging levels.
Merz, who is in a coalition government with the socialists, has promised tougher migration controls but has so far failed to implement any meaningful change.
The confrontation with AfD has become harder for Germany’s established parties to avoid after Sunday’s result. Despite winning almost 44% of the vote, the AfD still faces the longstanding “firewall” under which Germany’s mainstream parties refuse political cooperation with it.
Merz has shown no sign of abandoning that approach. Following his party’s defeat, he acknowledged mistakes but rejected suggestions that he should step aside and said surrendering wasn’t an option.
AfD leaders, meanwhile, have seized on the election as evidence that their political isolation is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain. Co-leader Alice Weidel used Wednesday’s Bundestag debate to attack Merz’s leadership and portray the Saxony-Anhalt result as a rejection of his government.
Trump’s social media posts added an international dimension to that battle. His administration and political allies have previously criticized the exclusion of national conservative parties in Europe, while prominent figures in Trump’s orbit have openly expressed sympathy for the AfD.
The postponed telephone conversation carried significance beyond the latest dispute. Merz and Trump had planned to speak in connection with the 25th anniversary of the September 11 terrorist attacks, with Berlin emphasizing Germany’s continuing solidarity with the United States.
German officials claim the transatlantic relationship remains important despite disagreements between Berlin and Washington. Relations have nevertheless faced pressure over immigration, trade, Ukraine, and other foreign-policy questions since Trump returned to the White House.
For Merz, the immediate challenge remains at home. The AfD’s 43.8% showing against the CDU’s 17.2% has dramatically altered the political landscape in Saxony-Anhalt and intensified questions about the chancellor’s ability to reverse his party’s losses.
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Germany’s Merz ‘shocked’ by far-right AfD state election victory – National– globalnews.ca
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German Chancellor Friedrich Merz doubled down Monday on pushing through unpopular reforms to Europe’s largest economy after a far-right party surged to a landslide victory in a regional election, with a very good chance of forming the first far-right state government since the Nazi era.
Merz said his center-right Christian Democratic Union was “deeply shocked” by what he called “the most serious election defeat that the CDU has had for years, for decades.” But he indicated that he’s determined to stay at the helm and said that “giving up is not an option for me.”
The anti-migration and Russia-friendly Alternative for Germany, or AfD, fell just short of a majority in Sunday’s vote in Saxony-Anhalt, a small eastern state that gained outsized prominence as AfD eyed power there. Its regional branch is one of several considered a proven right-wing extremist group by Germany’s domestic intelligence agency.
AfD’s victory is a major distraction for Germany and Merz at a time when Europe faces several challenges, including Russia’s continued aggression against Ukraine, a suspected sabotage campaign targeting NATO countries, and difficult dealings with U.S. President Donald Trump.
German far-right party taunts chancellor after its election triumph. He says it won’t win a majority– abcnews.com
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BERLIN — A leader of Alternative for Germany taunted Chancellor Friedrich Merz in parliament Wednesday after it thrashed his party in a regional election. The German leader countered that the far-right party won’t win a majority in the country, assailing its stance toward Ukraine and rhetoric on migration.
Merz is under pressure after Alternative for Germany, or AfD, surged to its biggest win yet in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt on Sunday, while the chancellor’s center-right Christian Democratic Union lost about half its support in the election.
The result underlined AfD’s skill in harnessing discontent with issues well beyond its core theme of curbing immigration as an unpopular national government struggles to turn around a stubbornly sluggish economy.
Two more states are scheduled to hold elections on Sept. 20: Berlin and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, an eastern state where AfD is strong but Merz’s CDU has long been weak.
AfD’s national co-leader, Alice Weidel, told Merz as she opened the annual budget debate in parliament that “in Saxony-Anhalt, people didn’t just punish you, they pulverized your party.”
“You haven’t understood the message that voters in Saxony-Anhalt sent you on Sunday,” she said. “But that isn’t relevant because your time has run out anyway. Citizens want a change of policy and they will get it.”
Weidel predicted future elections will produce “a clear mandate to govern” for her party.
A combative Merz responded that AfD’s state election result was “remarkable” but noted the party said during the campaign it would only govern with an absolute majority and then missed that target.
Voters “gave us, me as well, a clear message. But you don’t have the absolute majority, and you won’t achieve it in Germany. You won’t get majorities anywhere in Germany with these policies,” Merz said. “You are, and remain, Ms. Weidel, a destructive force.”
Merz pointed toward Weidel’s comments on Ukraine. AfD opposes aid to the country and advocates lifting sanctions against Russia.
“While the U.S. is making another attempt to end the murderous Ukraine war, you are stepping up the war propaganda and the confrontation with Russia, and burning the last bridges to distract from your own disastrous political record,” Weidel told Merz.
The chancellor vowed Germany will continue supporting Ukraine, and told AfD lawmakers that “your reactions only show that you obviously intend to continue the downright grotesque inversion of perpetrator and victim.”
He said “you clearly continue to stand by Russia when it comes to defending our freedom,” and noted Weidel didn’t mention an attempted drone attack at Germany’s Leipzig/Halle airport, which the government last week blamed on Russia.
Merz, whose government has moved to toughen migration policy, also attacked AfD’s use of the politically charged term “remigration” while pushing for more deportations.
“The word ‘remigration’ is nothing but a synonym for ethnic cleansing according to origin and skin color,” Merz told lawmakers, contending that implementing it would mean hospitals, nursing homes, restaurants and many businesses would be unable to work.
“That we must deport more is a consensus in the (governing) coalition,” Merz said, but it differentiates between people who work and are welcome in Germany and those who don’t have a right to residence.
AfD’s victory in Saxony-Anhalt was applauded by far-right parties across Europe. It also caught the attention of U.S. President Donald Trump.
“Wow! The Populist Party in Germany just had a really big night,” Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform Tuesday.
“They finally got tired of the absolutely horrible Immigration rules and regulations which have hurt Germany so badly,” Trump added, without mentioning the party by name. “THEY ARE ON THE RISE, and not going to take it anymore!”
German vote shows rise of far-right in Europe, but it hasn’t been a steady march– abcnews.com
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BRUSSELS — The first victory of the Alternative for Germany in a state election has renewed fears of an ascendant far-right in Europe, as voters repeatedly vent discontent and mainstream leaders grapple with myriad crises, from affordability to Russian aggression and scraps with China and the United States over trade.
But while anti-immigrant, pro-Russian parties have made inroads across the continent in recent years, there have also been notable reversals, and some have softened their views to build coalitions with moderates.
The AfD fell short of an absolute majority in Sunday’s vote in Saxony-Anhalt that would have allowed it to form the first far-right state government since the Nazi era — though it may still manage to do so.
Far-right leaders from Portugal to Austria celebrated the win as they ready for elections across Europe in the coming months. These will show whether the vote was a watershed moment in the demise of an anti-fascist consensus dating back to the World War II, or the latest in a series of elections worldwide in which frustrated voters simply cast out incumbents.
The far-right’s biggest success in recent years was the rise of Giorgia Meloni, who became prime minister of Italy, one of Europe’s most influential countries, at the helm of a party with neo-fascist roots.
But Meloni, who campaigned as an EU-skeptic, took a moderate turn in office that has won praise from across the continent and led to her presiding over the most stable government in decades. She now faces a challenge from the right, in the form of an upstart party led by a retired general.
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Germany’s federal system of government makes the country’s politics seem so complicated that most people outside Germany give up trying to understand it. At the federal level, there is the parliament (the Bundestag), a ceremonial president and a chancellor. At the moment, all of those branches of power seem normal enough, and are run by the same few democratic parties that have been there since the fall of the Berlin Wall. But if you look the next level down, at the individual states (or länder), the picture that emerges is terrifying.
Germany is still culturally and economically split in two by the old Iron Curtain. Nearly 40 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, the promised reunification has still not been completed. People living in the former East look at the Berlin government and see policies that seem to ignore them. There are five states in the eastern part of the country, and opinion polls show majority support for the radical right party Alternative for Germany in all of them. This September, two of these states, Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, will be holding elections in which AfD candidates are expected to win, putting them in charge of state governments for the first time. They are hoping for absolute majorities. That would give them sole control of the education system, the prisons and the police force.
To the despair of the European establishment, the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), the most hated political force in Germany, keeps showing robust signs of life, whether in its impressive showing in a state election on Sunday or in a recent courtroom victory. On Sunday, the AfD more than doubled its previous vote share for the parliament of Baden-Württemberg, a key industrial state in western Germany. On February 26, a German court enjoined the country’s domestic spy agency from classifying Germany’s second most popular political party as a “confirmed right-wing extremist” organization. The “confirmed right-wing extremist” designation has been a key tool in the campaign among establishment and left-wing politicians to ban the AfD entirely.
The AfD’s fate should not be a matter of indifference to American conservatives. The globalist elites must be broken everywhere if they are to be permanently broken at all.
Growing numbers of the German public defy their overseers and welcome the AfD as an antidote to the EU-Davos philosophy of open borders and the deindustrialization and immiseration that go under the banner of climate-friendly energy policy. The AfD polls second nationally to the Christian Democratic Union (CDU). The CDU was once the cornerstone of postwar conservatism, but its leaders have pulled it to the left in order to marginalize the AfD. In February 2025, Chancellor (and CDU party head) Friedrich Merz cobbled together an ideologically incoherent governing coalition whose sole purpose is to shut the AfD out of power, despite the AfD’s receiving the second largest share of the German vote. The establishment proudly refers to this exclusionary strategy as the “firewall,” which allegedly protects German democracy from falling into the hands of purported neo-Nazis.
BERLIN — Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s party has made a disappointing start to a year packed with German state elections, suffering a narrow defeat in an important industrial region after a prominent candidate powered the environmentalist Greens to a come-from-behind victory.
Merz’s center-right Christian Democratic Union was long confident of winning back the governor’s office in Baden-Württemberg, a region of more than 11 million people in southwestern Germany that is home to automakers Mercedes-Benz and Porsche, among many other companies. The country’s first and so far only Green governor, Winfried Kretschmann, is retiring after 15 years in charge of a traditional conservative heartland.
A CDU victory long looked likely despite the unpopularity of Merz’s 10-month-old federal government, which has struggled to get Germany’s stagnant economy moving. But the party’s poll lead shrank ahead of Sunday’s election thanks to a Green campaign focused on Cem Özdemir, a longtime federal lawmaker and former German agriculture minister.
Differing opinions on the U.S.-Israel strikes against Iran have emerged in Europe, with key Western allies standing strong with the United States, despite some voices bemoaning the escalation and calling for restraint.
Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla, joint chairs of the AfD parliamentary group in the German Bundestag, issued the following statement:
“We have noted with great concern the attacks by Israel and the USA on Iran. We call on all warring parties to exercise absolute restraint. The civilian population and civilian infrastructure must be protected. International law and international humanitarian law must be fully respected. The renewed destabilization of the Middle East is not in Germany’s interest and must be stopped,” wrote the party in a statement.
The AfD’s stance on Israel, one of the two main actors currently attacking Iran, has been at odds with many other European conservative parties, which are often extremely pro-Israel.
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Excerpt:
Since Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s center-left coalition collapsed over budget squabbles and a lost confidence vote on 16 December 2024, Germany has entered an unusually tense campaign ahead of snap elections on 23 February 2025.1 The country’s political arena has moved away from long-standing centrism toward heightened polarization — a shift that is also felt in the streets. Just weeks before the elections, hundreds of thousands protested nationwide after the center-right Christian Democratic Union party’s Friedrich Merz — the likely next chancellor according to polls — relied on support from the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) to push a parliamentary motion for tougher migration laws.2 Although the bill was ultimately rejected and Merz ruled out any coalition with the far right, it nonetheless breached a post-war norm observed by Germany’s mainstream parties referred to as the ‘firewall,’ whereby collaboration with far-right forces was consistently avoided.3
Long seen as Europe’s engine of stability and growth, Germany is grappling with mounting challenges. A sluggish post-pandemic recovery, rising populism, and entrenched urban-rural and East-West divides have fueled discontent and polarization. Meanwhile, infighting among members of the ruling coalition and reignited debates over energy, immigration, and foreign policy have sparked street activism and bolstered the opposition.4 The AfD, in particular, is gaining ground, with polls projecting it as the second-strongest parliamentary force in the upcoming elections.5
Amid such polarization, national vote season appears to be an increasingly perilous time for German politicians. The 2024 European Parliament election campaign offered a worrying preview, as it was marred by a spate of aggressions against local centrist party officials, candidates, and campaign volunteers, while revealing a larger pattern of violence targeting politicians across the spectrum.6 Looking at both last year’s European vote and the high-stakes federal election on 23 February, this piece explores how rising polarization has intensified street activism in the form of demonstrations, both against far-right parties and government policies; it also considers whether polarization is contributing to an uptick in political violence, particularly amid the mounting tensions surrounding national elections.