The far-right party Alternative for Germany (AfD) won Sunday's state election in Saxony-Anhalt, in the former communist east of the country, with 43.8% of the vote, more than double its previous result. According to the BBC, it is the first significant election win for a radical right-wing nationalist party with a real chance of governing at regional level since the fall of the Third Reich in 1945. The party narrowly missed an absolute majority, however, and to form a government it would need allies that the other parties rule out being, according to news site G1.
In Berlin, Chancellor Friedrich Merz, of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), said on Monday he was "deeply shocked". His party slumped to 17.2%, about 20 points below its result in the previous state election, and Merz called it the CDU's "hardest electoral defeat in decades". He admitted his own unpopularity was a constant theme of the campaign, defended his government's reform course and ruled out stepping down: "Giving up is not an option for me". He said he would meet his coalition partner, the Social Democratic Party (SPD), in the coming days.
"Since yesterday, not only Saxony-Anhalt has changed, but all of Germany. This election result will have consequences." (Friedrich Merz, German chancellor)
What it means for Brazil
For Brazil, the result matters through trade and diplomacy. Germany has the largest economy in the European Union (EU), and the EU is one of Brazil's largest trading partners. The BBC analysis argues that a weakened Germany, distracted by domestic crisis, limits what the bloc can do at a time when Europe faces the war in Ukraine, tariffs from the administration of Donald Trump and economic competition with China. A continent turned inward has less room for the external agenda Brasília cares about, from trade to climate, in a year when Brazilians elect a president in October with the relationship with Washington already a campaign theme.
The interests at play
The international reaction came quickly. Trump posted the Saxony-Anhalt exit poll on his social network, Truth Social. In the BBC's assessment, the AfD's anti-immigration, "Germany for Germans" message echoes the Make America Great Again movement, and the party borrows its playbook: attacking the traditional media, questioning the neutrality of judges and promising to "make Germany great again". From Russia, the executive Kirill Dmitriev, head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund, called the result "historic", the German government "discredited", and compared Merz to former British prime minister Keir Starmer. Moscow's interest is direct: Germany is the largest single donor of aid to Ukraine, while the AfD wants to halt military aid to Kyiv, suspend sanctions and resume buying cheap Russian energy.
At home, the vote exposes the east-west divide. Saxony-Anhalt has just 1.7 million of Germany's 59 million voters, is the country's poorest state and keeps alive the "Ostalgie", a nostalgia for communist East Germany, even though Germany has spent between 2.3 and 3 trillion euros integrating the region since the Berlin Wall fell in 1989, the BBC reports. German authorities classify the AfD as antidemocratic and its state branch as a far-right radical faction, yet the party now polls as the largest in the country. In Brussels, the fear is that the win will shape the next 12 months, with elections due in key EU countries such as France, Italy, Spain and Poland.
The formation of a state government remains open. The AfD's lead candidate, Ulrich Siegmund, said the party has a "clear mandate to govern", and supporters celebrated under the slogan "everything is possible". Without an absolute majority, however, the AfD would need partners, and the other parties rule out supporting it, according to G1. The next milestones are state elections in Berlin and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania in two weeks; after those votes, Merz promised an internal review of the CDU and of his coalition.