Merz Digs In After CDU's Twin State Election Losses

German Chancellor Friedrich Merz is battling to steady his position and keep his reform agenda on course after his party suffered two more regional election defeats, including one that removed it from a state legislature for the first time in the history of the federal republic.

Merz, who is unpopular, said within minutes of polls closing on Sunday that he would remain in office and press ahead with reforms to Europe's largest economy. He nonetheless described the outcome in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania as a "disaster."

Final results showed the center-right Christian Democratic Union finishing just under the 5% threshold needed to hold seats in the regional parliament of the rural Baltic Sea coast state — the first such failure in 77 years of modern Germany — after losing more than half its support there.

In Berlin, the CDU slipped to second place behind the hard-left Left Party, which is now best placed to lead the next city government. Depending on how coalition negotiations unfold, Merz's party could still keep a foothold in city hall.

Neither state is a political heavyweight. The CDU's 2023 victory in Berlin was its only win in the capital in a quarter-century, and the party was already weak in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. But the scale of the loss in the eastern state compounds the difficulties facing Merz, coming two weeks after a sharp defeat by the far-right Alternative for Germany in Saxony-Anhalt — another formerly communist eastern region — which dented his authority and fuelled speculation about his replacement.

AfD emerged as the strongest party in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, with the center-left Social Democrats, the junior partner in Merz's national coalition, close behind. The Social Democrats centered their campaign on state governor Manuela Schwesig as a bulwark against the far right, a polarization that squeezed other mainstream parties, including the CDU. A left-leaning three-party coalition under Schwesig would command a majority in the new regional legislature.

Schwesig and others in the governing parties have questioned parts of the federal reform agenda, which is intended to revive a chronically sluggish economy. The plans include a potentially painful overhaul of the pension system, cuts to Germany's stifling bureaucracy and income tax relief for low- and middle-income families.

The head of the Social Democrats' group in the national parliament, Matthias Miersch, said it was clear that "we need reforms," but told ARD television that "we must also take people's concerns seriously."

Merz was due to hold further meetings with his party's leadership on Monday. Much will hinge on the CDU's influential regional leaders; the party's eight state governors backed the chancellor last week, though questions lingered over how wholehearted that support was.

No further electoral tests remain this year, but five state elections are scheduled for next year, three of them in April. They include North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany's most populous state, currently led by a prominent CDU figure often cited as a possible successor to Merz, Hendrik Wüst. None of the five contests is in the east, where AfD is strongest.