AfD Eyes First Far-Right State Win in Saxony-Anhalt — SkimNews
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- AfD leads Saxony-Anhalt polls at 40%, ahead of the CDU at 23%, and could become the first far-right party to win a German state government since 1945 if it secures an outright majority.
- Ulrich Siegmund, AfD's top candidate and a former CDU member dubbed "Germany's most dangerous man" by Der Spiegel, predicted an absolute majority and told Bild: "If no one wants to work with us, then we'll just have to do it alone."
- An outright AfD win would let it govern alone, bypassing the mainstream "firewall" noncooperation policy, which the party has already broken at the local level.
- Between 15,000 and 20,000 demonstrators gathered in Magdeburg for a "festival of democracy" the night before the vote.
- Friedrich Merz, Germany's deeply unpopular chancellor, urged fellow politicians at a Lower Saxony rally to "address the issues at hand" and "address our choice of words" in engaging the far right.
- Martin Reichardt, AfD's state leader, previously told the party's youth organization that Germany had become "a lazy, anti-social bum reeking of dope."
- If AfD falls short of a majority, a CDU-led administration under incumbent state premier Sven Schulze is the most likely outcome, potentially followed by weeks of coalition talks.
Why it matters: An outright AfD majority in Saxony-Anhalt would break the mainstream "firewall" that has kept Germany's far right out of state executive power, letting it govern without coalition partners. A win hands momentum to AfD ahead of the 2029 federal election and delivers another eastern defeat to Chancellor Merz and a CDU already trailing by 17 points.
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