The Alternative for Germany (AfD) remains well ahead in the polls five weeks ahead of a crucial election in the eastern state of Saxony-Anhalt, where the far-right party could secure an unprecedented absolute majority and take power at state level for the first time.<\/p>\n
The latest poll by Infratest dimap on Thursday put the AfD on 41%, well above Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s Christian Democrats (CDU) on 24%.<\/p>\n
Further back are a trio of left-wing parties: The Left on 13%, the Social Democrats (SPD) on 7% and the Greens on 5%.<\/p>\n
The anti-immigrant AfD has never participated in a state coalition, as all other mainstream German parties refuse working with it in a policy known as the “firewall.”<\/p>\n
But 41% could be close to earning the AfD an absolute majority in the state parliament in Magdeburg, depending on how many minor parties miss out on the 5% threshold needed to win seats.<\/p>\n
This would allow the AfD to bypass the firewall and take control of a state government for the first time.<\/p>\n
The state heads to the polls on September 6, two weeks before votes in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and Berlin, where the AfD is also riding high in the polls.<\/p>\n
The election campaign is expected to be influenced by the deadly Islamist attack on Berlin Pride on Saturday.<\/p>\n
Infratest dimap surveyed 1,149 eligible voters in Saxony-Anhalt by telephone and online between July 23-28.<\/p>\n
According to the poll, dissatisfaction with the state government in Magdeburg – comprising the CDU, SPD and Free Democrats (FDP) – continues to grow. Only 29% of those surveyed are now very satisfied or satisfied with the government’s work.<\/p>\n
When asked which party should lead the next state government, the AfD and the CDU are almost neck and neck, according to the latest poll.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Alternative for Germany (AfD) remains well ahead in the polls five weeks ahead of a crucial election…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":64173,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[452,4199,24448,393,48836,5,42623,3849,48837],"class_list":["post-64172","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-germany","tag-afd","tag-cdu","tag-christian-democrats","tag-friedrich-merz","tag-german-state-election","tag-germany","tag-magdeburg","tag-saxony-anhalt","tag-state-government"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64172","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64172"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64172\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64173"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64172"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64172"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/germany\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64172"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}