German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has vowed to press ahead with potentially painful reforms to Europe’s largest economy after suffering painful electoral setbacks, including his party’s historic defeats in two state elections on Sunday.
Public broadcaster ARD predicted on Sunday night that Merz’s centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) would have just 4.9% of support in Mecklenburg-West Pomerania, the party’s lowest result in any state since World War II. The anti-immigration, pro-Russia party Alternative for Germany (AfD) made a significant leap forward on Sunday. ARD TV made its predictions based on exit polls and partial aggregation.
If the CDU receives less than 5% of the final vote, it will be the first time the party has failed to win a seat in a state parliament anywhere in Germany.
Merz acknowledged the party’s results as a “disaster” but struck a defiant tone, refusing to back away from the government’s reform agenda. He argued that Germany’s economic and political problems made difficult and potentially unpopular reforms more urgent, not less urgent, and vowed to press ahead with them.
“What we need to do now will require spine, fortitude and perseverance,” Mertz said in a statement shortly after the exit polls were announced on public television. “I will demonstrate these qualities as president of the CDU and above all as prime minister of our country.”
According to ARD, the CDU is expected to come in second place in Berlin with 19.1%, behind the left-wing parties with 25.3%.
Merz’s authority had already been damaged by the CDU’s crushing defeat to the AfD in the small eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt on September 6. The results shocked many Germans who believed their country had become immune to nationalism and claims of racial superiority after facing the horrors of the Nazi past through laws outlawing education and persecution.
On Sunday, the AfD also made significant gains in both states. According to ARD, it won 37.9% of the vote in Mecklenburg-West Pomerania and 16.2% in Berlin. However, the situation was far from establishing a local government.
“We have replaced the CDU as a national party,” AfD national co-leader Alice Weidel told ZDF television.
He added: “We have a lot to offer voters, and that is political change in this country.”
But in an apparent reference to far-right parties, Merz said government reforms would be “an antidote to the poison of authoritarianism that is increasingly permeating our society as interest in it grows.”
The government’s reforms include cutting income taxes for low- and middle-income households, overhauling a creaky pension system and cutting Germany’s stuffy bureaucracy.
Merz, 70, took over Germany’s leadership 16 months ago and promised to revive an economy that has seen little growth in recent years. However, he has been unable to improve the nation’s gloomy mood and has become deeply unpopular.
The AfD’s strong performance in the Saxony-Anhalt state election gave it its best chance to form the first far-right regional government since World War II, further weakening the prime minister’s national standing.
Over the past two weeks, there have been calls for the prime minister’s removal from within the party, but top-level members of the alliance have not publicly called for his resignation, and many have warned of a “personnel dispute.”
Philipp Amthor, a prominent CDU figure from Mecklenburg-Vorpommern who now manages relations between the federal and cantonal governments in the Prime Minister’s Office, said on Sunday night that one of the campaign’s problems had been the “difficult personnel negotiations” of recent weeks. This is clearly a reference to speculation regarding Mr. Mertz.
“It is good and right that these personnel discussions do not continue at this time,” he said.
