AfD’s Historic Win Puts Germany’s Political Firewall to the Test
The AfD’s breakthrough in Saxony-Anhalt marks a new stage in Germany’s political realignment. With almost half of the vote, the far-right party has become the state’s dominant political force, putting renewed pressure on the Brandmauer and exposing the growing electoral divide between eastern Germany and the political establishment in Berlin.
The Alternative for Germany (AfD) has delivered one of the strongest political signals in Germany in recent years with its victory in the Saxony-Anhalt state election. Preliminary results put the party on around 44% of the vote, more than double its result in 2021. Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) came second with roughly 17–18%.
This is more than a breakthrough for the AfD in one eastern state. The party has reached a level of support that allows it to position itself as the region’s dominant political force, while the traditional party system has weakened significantly compared with five years ago.
A Victory Without a Majority
Despite the scale of its result, the AfD does not have enough seats to form a government on its own. Preliminary projections suggest that the party will hold 39 seats in the state parliament, while 42 are needed for an absolute majority.
This creates the central contradiction of the election. The AfD has won by a substantial margin but remains politically isolated. The CDU, SPD, Greens and Die Linke have ruled out cooperation with the party, meaning that an electoral victory does not automatically translate into control of the state government.
For the AfD, this is both a problem and a strategic opportunity. The party can present the result as evidence that its support is no longer simply a protest phenomenon, but has become a permanent part of Germany’s political landscape. Its success in Saxony-Anhalt also gives it a stronger argument for challenging the rules under which other parties refuse any form of cooperation.
The Brandmauer Comes Under Pressure
The so-called Brandmauer — Germany’s political firewall against the AfD — has for years been one of the central principles of the country’s party system. The basic logic is straightforward: mainstream democratic parties may compete with one another, but they do not enter coalitions with the AfD.
The Saxony-Anhalt result puts that principle under greater pressure than ever before. The AfD can no longer be treated as a small opposition force that can be isolated without serious consequences for parliamentary arithmetic. It has secured almost half of the vote and emerged as the largest parliamentary group.
At the same time, the formal dismantling of the Brandmauer does not appear inevitable. If the CDU seeks to form a government without the AfD, it will have to construct a complicated coalition involving several parties with substantial ideological differences. That could make the process of forming a government lengthy and potentially unstable.
A Serious Setback for the CDU
For Friedrich Merz, the result is particularly damaging. The CDU has governed Saxony-Anhalt since 2002, winning more than 37% of the vote in the 2021 election. A fall to roughly 17% represents the loss of around half of its previous support.
The election also comes amid declining confidence in the federal government. Economic growth remains weak, while the new government’s promises to accelerate the economy and restore Germany’s competitiveness have yet to produce the political impact the CDU had hoped for.
The AfD has exploited this environment by turning the election into a broader referendum on the performance of the established parties. For voters in eastern Germany, economic pressures, demographic decline, migration and a sense of political distance from Berlin have increasingly converged.
Eastern Germany Remains a Distinct Political Space
Saxony-Anhalt is part of the former East Germany, where political and socio-economic differences between the eastern and western parts of the country remain significant. Since reunification, the region has experienced population decline, the loss of younger residents and long-term structural economic challenges.
The AfD has turned this sense of disadvantage into a political message, combining a hard-line approach to migration with criticism of the federal government and established parties. Economic concerns and declining trust in Berlin have helped drive support for the party, while migration remains one of its most effective mobilisation issues.
The demographic dimension is particularly important. The state is simultaneously dealing with an ageing population and labour shortages, while the AfD advocates a substantially more restrictive approach to migration. In the long term, this creates a tension between the party’s political mobilisation strategy and the region’s economic needs.
A New Generation of AfD Politics
The Saxony-Anhalt result also highlights a change in how the AfD is building its political presence. The party’s leading candidate, 35-year-old Ulrich Siegmund, has developed a substantial following on TikTok and other social media platforms.
His campaign reflected a broader shift away from traditional political communication. The AfD is increasingly targeting younger voters through digital platforms, combining political messaging with highly personalised candidate profiles. This gives the party an opportunity to reach beyond the electorate traditionally associated with it.
For Germany’s mainstream parties, this means that containing the AfD can no longer be limited to parliamentary isolation. The party has developed its own media ecosystem and is increasingly capable of turning state elections into nationwide political campaigns.
From State Election to Federal Risk
The most important question now goes beyond who will eventually lead the government in Saxony-Anhalt. The AfD’s victory creates a new political reality ahead of further state elections and is likely to influence calculations at federal level.
For the CDU, the result is a warning that the AfD is capable not merely of attracting protest votes, but of directly challenging Germany’s leading conservative party. At federal level, the AfD has already topped some opinion polls. Its latest success gives it another argument that it can translate polling strength into actual electoral victories.
Upcoming elections in Lower Saxony, Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and Berlin will help determine whether Saxony-Anhalt was a regional exception or part of a broader realignment of German politics.
For Berlin, however, the immediate lesson is already clear: political isolation has not stopped the AfD’s electoral growth. The party has now moved sufficiently close to power at state level for the question to shift from whether it can be kept out of government to how long the established parties can sustain the firewall without further weakening their own electoral bases.
Sources: Reuters, The Guardian, Euractiv, Al Jazeera, Associated Press