A 44% Far-Right Surge in Saxony-Anhalt Threatens to Shatter Germany’s Postwar Political Firewall

In Magdeburg, the exit polls hit like a shockwave. At over 44 percent of the vote, the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) was projected to have more than doubled its showing from five years ago in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt, a region of 2.1 million people west of Berlin. “We have written history,” declared Ulrich Siegmund, the AfD’s anti-migration candidate for governor, as the results came in.

The political “firewall” that defined postwar German stability—the mainstream parties’ refusal to work with the AfD—now faces a mathematical reality that may render it functionally unworkable. The CDU’s national general-secretary, Franziska Hoppermann, stated the party’s position without ambiguity: “AfD is a right-wing extremist party. It wants to leave the euro; that would be economic downfall … it works closely together with Russia, it wants a completely different social model. We will not work with them.”

Siegmund, 35, told public broadcaster ARD that voters had sent a message that “things cannot carry on like this,” adding that it was “also a signal toward Berlin.” His taunt was pointed directly at the chancellor: “A very good campaigner for us in this election campaign was Friedrich Merz. Every day this man is in the chancellery is one too many.”

At the center of the crisis is the collapse of Chancellor Merz’s Christian Democratic Union, which had led Saxony-Anhalt for 24 years. Projections for ARD and ZDF public television put the CDU at just 18 percent, losing about half its support. The Left Party, the center-left Social Democrats, and the Greens were each seen polling around 9 percent. It was unclear whether the BSW party would reach the 5 percent threshold needed to win seats. The projections put AfD at least marginally short of an absolute majority for now, but that could change—and even without it, a vote share above 33 percent grants AfD a structural “blocking minority” (Sperrminorität) capable of vetoing state constitutional judges and structural appointments, making the state ungovernable under traditional consensus rules.

Siegmund’s platform is an active institutional battle. He has promised “a deportation offensive” and an end to incentives for people to come to Germany and “exploit our social system.” He also wants to initiate a process to pull Saxony-Anhalt from the regional public broadcaster over allegations of “disinformation.” Germany’s 16 states have extensive powers, including overseeing security matters and running the education system, which would give him direct control over police forces to implement his agenda.

The State Office for the Protection of the Constitution (Verfassungsschutz) formally classified the Saxony-Anhalt AfD regional branch as “definitively right-wing extremist” in late 2023 due to anti-constitutional rhetoric and Siegmund’s attendance at radical exile planning meetings. An AfD leader in a neighboring state has appealed two convictions for knowingly using a Nazi slogan. The party has pushed back on accusations of extremism as politically motivated. The party promotes “remigration,” which pushes for the deportation of immigrants.

The election comes amid widespread public discontent with the national government, which has yet to convince many voters it can get the country’s sluggish economy back on track. The voters’ rebellion is a complex mix of anti-incumbent anger, economic anxiety, migration pushback, and regional alienation from Berlin. In the formerly communist and less prosperous east, where Saxony-Anhalt sits, resentment over energy policy, inflation, and federal industrial transition mandates has fueled an exodus from the CDU to the AfD.

After the projections were released, members of various coalitions protested against the AfD on the Römer, holding a sign that read “Anti-social, fascist, stupid!!!”

AfD had sought to form the country’s first far-right state government since the end of World War II in 1945. Achieving that would be the biggest victory in the anti-migration party’s 13-year history. Unlike several other European countries, modern Germany has not had a far-right or right-wing populist party leading a national, state, or major-city government. AfD is the largest opposition party in Germany’s national parliament, and its regional branch in Saxony-Anhalt is one of several classified as a confirmed right-wing extremist group by the domestic intelligence agency, which cites members’ disparagement of migrants from Muslim countries, among other things.

Regardless of the final tally, the result is a devastating blow to Merz, whose federal fragility is now exposed. The juxtaposition of the far-right surge and the collapsing center leaves Germany’s postwar governing paradigm in question, with the immediate future of political stability openly unresolved.