AfD Claims Path to Replacing CDU After State Election Wins in Germany
AfD co-leaders say weekend state election results show the far-right party has replaced the CDU as Germany's people's party, as Chancellor Merz faces mounting pressure.
Leaders of Germany's far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) said on Monday that weekend regional election results demonstrate the party is on a path to supplanting the centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU).
Speaking at a news conference in Berlin, AfD co-leaders Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla described the party's performance in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Berlin as "excellent." Weidel highlighted the party's showing in the capital, where it secured 16 percent of the vote, calling it an outstanding result given that the Left Party had absorbed much of the rival camp.
"In Berlin, a very clear trend is emerging that we will replace the CDU," Weidel said. She described the outcome as the AfD's second consecutive state election victory and said it showed the party had replaced the CDU as the people's party. For the first time in its history, she added, the CDU is no longer represented in a state parliament at all — a result she attributed to what she called an unintelligent firewall policy. She said the CDU must now decide how to proceed.
Chrupalla said it was not the AfD's job to destroy the CDU, adding that voters in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania had made their decision. He also rejected characterisations of the CDU as conservative, calling it pseudo-conservative and arguing it had distanced itself from conservatism by aligning with the Left Party and the Social Democrats at the federal level.
The results mark another setback for Chancellor Friedrich Merz, who faces a struggle to stabilise his position and keep his agenda on track after voters handed his party two more defeats. Merz vowed to stay on and push through reforms shortly after polls closed on Sunday.
Final results underscored the scale of what Merz conceded was a "disaster" in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, a largely rural eastern region on the Baltic Sea coast. Neither state is among Germany's political heavyweights. The CDU's 2023 win in Berlin was its only victory in the capital in the past 25 years, and the party was already weak in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania.
The manner of the defeat in the latter adds to the headwinds Merz faces after a stinging loss to the AfD two weeks ago in Saxony-Anhalt, another formerly communist eastern region, which damaged his authority and sparked speculation about his replacement.
The AfD emerged as the strongest party in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, but the centre-left Social Democrats — the junior partner in Merz's national governing coalition — finished fairly close behind after a campaign centred on state governor Manuela Schwesig as a bulwark against the far right. That polarisation squeezed other mainstream parties, including the CDU. A left-leaning three-party coalition under Schwesig would hold a majority in the new regional legislature.