For the first time, a member of the Alternative for Germany now presides over a German state parliament. Tobias Rausch was elected president of the Saxony-Anhalt Landtag on Tuesday, 6 October, at the new chamber’s opening session in Magdeburg.
Rausch received 48 votes. According to reports citing the result, 29 lawmakers voted against him and five abstained. An absolute majority required 42 votes.
Nine more votes than the AfD has seats
The arithmetic is the story.
The AfD won 43.8 percent of the vote in the 6 September state election
and holds
39 of the 83 seats in the new Landtag
. That is the largest group, but short of a majority.
The party’s own post on the vote, quoted by the US site Hot Air, noted that Rausch won nine more votes than the AfD has members in its group. Those extra votes came from elsewhere. The Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW), which holds five seats, had said beforehand that it would back him. That leaves at least four more votes from other groups.
The World Socialist Web Site, which opposes the AfD, reported that at least four votes came from parties beyond the AfD and BSW. It said the AfD had previously claimed there were defectors within the CDU. Hot Air also reported that CDU members crossed party lines. Neither outlet named any lawmaker, and the ballot was secret. The claim is unconfirmed.
Why the BSW did it
BSW group leader Thomas Schulze defended the decision on public broadcaster MDR, according to the World Socialist Web Site. He argued that the AfD is the largest group and that Rausch had been constructive in talks on specific issues. Party founder Sahra Wagenknecht, quoted by the same outlet, welcomed the end of what she called the “firewall idiocy.”
That firewall is the long-standing pledge by Germany’s established parties not to cooperate with the AfD. Supporters see it as a defence against a party that Saxony-Anhalt’s domestic intelligence office, according to Wikipedia, classified in 2023 as a definite right-wing extremist effort. Critics, including AfD supporters, say it ignores the choice of a large share of voters.
The AfD has long argued that the largest group should, by custom, hold the speaker’s post. In many German parliaments that has been the practice, though it is not a legal guarantee.
The December test
The next question is who will lead the state government. Sven Schulze of the CDU is the current minister-president. After the election, Al Jazeera reported, he acknowledged the result had hit his party hard and said he did not intend to cooperate with the AfD. His CDU won 17.2 percent and 15 seats, well behind the AfD’s 43.8 percent.
A premier is due to be elected in December. The AfD’s lead candidate, Ulrich Siegmund, would need a majority. If he drew the same 48 votes Rausch did, the World Socialist Web Site noted, he could become the first AfD state premier. Whether the same coalition of support would hold for a vote on a head of government, rather than a presiding officer, is untested.
The two jobs differ. The parliament president chairs sessions, represents the chamber and sets much of its procedure. A premier runs the government and its budget. Some lawmakers may consider the first acceptable and the second not.
A national backdrop
The result in September was widely read as a setback for Chancellor Friedrich Merz. Al Jazeera described it as another blow to his authority, as his coalition struggles to revive growth. The party’s response in Magdeburg will be watched in Berlin, where the CDU has also held to the no-cooperation line.
The sources available for this account include no statement from CDU leaders about the speaker vote. Nor did they say what position the SPD, Greens and Left, who together hold 24 seats, took beyond voting against. The 29 votes against are fewer than the 33 seats held by the CDU, SPD, Left and Greens combined, which is consistent with some defections or absences, though the sources do not explain the gap.
For now the AfD has its first top parliamentary post. Its opponents have two months to decide whether to block the next one.