An electoral earthquake has fractured Germany’s societal and political tectonic plates. In a state election on Sunday, the far-right Alternative for Germany party won 43.8% of the vote in Saxony-Anhalt, a state of roughly two million people in the eastern part of the country. When Friedrich Merz first campaigned to lead Germany’s conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU), in 2018, he vowed to reduce support for the far-right AfD in half.
In a bitter irony, Chancellor Merz’s CDU lost half its support in Saxony-Anhalt and after its resounding victory the AfD has become a direct threat to his leadership, and is beginning to overturn Germany’s postwar political order. The drubbing in Saxony-Anhalt may be only the beginning. Two more regional elections are scheduled later this month and could demonstrate the growing strength of Germany’s fringe parties and intensify pressure on Merz’s governing coalition in Berlin.
The AfD is more than a political disruptor. German domestic intelligence has classified parts of the party, including its Saxony-Anhalt chapter, as right-wing extremist. Yet the AfD has overtaken the CDU in national polls, while Merz’s approval ratings have fallen to levels unprecedented for a German chancellor.
Although Merz has backtracked on campaign promises, most notably his commitment to uphold the debt brake—loosening the constitutional limit on government borrowing—he has remained resolute in preserving the “firewall” between the CDU and AfD. That firewall is intended to keep Germany anchored in its postwar democracy deliberately constructed with guardrails against its darkest history to prevent backsliding into authoritarianism. The AfD has used Merz’s flip flop on the debt brake against him and is questioning defense spending on Ukraine.
Upon taking office in May 2025, a little over a year ago, Merz promised to revive Germany’s stagnant economy and increase defense spending to position the country as Europe’s de facto military leader. An antagonistic Russia and an unreliable America have left Germany with few alternatives. German businesses are suffering with high costs, American tariffs and intensifying competition from China.
Merz also made another defining promise: to beat back the AfD and restore the centrist CDU’s claim to being the true conservative party in Germany. Instead, the election in Saxony-Anhalt will amplify calls, including from within his own party, for him to step aside. Merz’s blunders over the past year cannot be dismissed as the mistakes of a political novice.
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