The right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party is attracting the attention of Americans after Elon Musk backed it last week, amid its growing popularity in the European nation—Newsweek has looked at the odds of the party actually winning Germany’s upcoming elections.
Musk’s message that “only the AfD can save Germany” came after the collapse of the German coalition government, when Chancellor Olaf Scholz lost a confidence vote, triggering snap elections in February.
Only the AfD can save Germany https://t.co/Afu0ea1Fvt
Meanwhile, Germany is still reeling from an attack on a Christmas market in Magdeburg, where Saudi Taleb Al Abdulmohsen allegedly drove his car into the crowd, killing at least five other people and injuring more than two hundred last Friday.
The AfD has become the first far-right party to win a national election in Germany since World War II, when it won Brandenburg in September.
While most Germans view the party unfavorably, the AfD’s current approval rating of 19% is what was recorded in eight years of Pew Research Center polling.
At the same time, other German parties have noted a decline in their popularity, with the popularity of Scholz’s Social Democratic Party (SPD) falling from 67% in 2022 to 39% this year, according to data from the Pew Research Center. And that was before the recent fall of the government.
“There is almost 0% that the AfD will win first position in the legislative elections on February 23 and an even smaller percentage that it will win an absolute majority,” said Eric Langenbacher, senior researcher and director of Society, Culture and Politics. the American-German Institute program told Newsweek.
“Of course, there are ‘unknowns’ and the consequences of the recent attack on the Magdeburg Christmas market, in the deeper electoral context of widespread considerations about migration and integration, may give a small boost to the AfD,” he added.
The party is currently polling at 19 percent, according to Politico’s most recent general election survey, updated on December 16.
While the AfD is ahead of the SPD (17%), it is evidently the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU)/Christian Social Union (CSU) that gets 31% in the polls.
Prediction market platform Polymarket estimates that the AfD has a 14.3 percent chance of winning, while the CDU/CSU has an 85 percent chance.
Although these figures make it look unlikely that the AfD would outright win Germany’s elections on February 23, the party seems set to gain more federal influence than it has ever had.
AfD co-chair Alice Weidel talks about Germany’s “big parties” (the CDU/CSU alliance and the SPD) to work with her party.
Earlier this year he said: “We ask the CDU/CSU and the FDP to, despite everything, do their civic duty and reach an agreement with us. After all, we are millions of voters. “
Both these parties have ruled out governing with the AfD. Before the September election, in the face of the AfD’s growing popularity, CDU leader Friedrich Merz repeated this pledge, saying: “Our word stands. We will not do it.”
Newsweek has contacted the CDU, via email, to ask if this is still the case.
Langenbacher said: “Postwar Germany has always had coalition governments so the question is if the established parties would countenance governing with this challenger party.
“At the moment, the answer is no, due to a casual firewall that hinders collaboration with the AfD. It is imaginable that in the long term the CDU/CSU’s preference for governing conservatively will erode this norm, but that will not happen in 2025”.
The party gained support for its anti-immigration and pro-border security stances after the 2015 refugee crisis. It promotes national security and identity, opposing globalism and multiculturalism.
But he has been labelled as far-right and has lately been under surveillance by Germany’s domestic intelligence agency, the BfV, on suspicion of extremism, which the AfD says is a political attempt to discredit the party.
In January, a news story revealed that personalities attended an assembly where extremists discussed the expulsion of millions of immigrants, including some with German citizenship, which sparked large protests against the far right.
One of the AfD’s best-known figures, Björn Höcke, was accused this year of a Nazi slogan; He denies the allegations.
AfD supporters worry about the German economy, are dissatisfied with the state of the country’s democracy and have a negative view of the European Union, according to the Pew Research Center.
Newsweek contacted AfD by email for comment.
Updated 12/24/24 at 3:36 AM m. ET: This article has been updated with comment from Eric Langenbacher.
Jordan King is a Newsweek journalist founded in London, UK. It focuses on human interest stories in Africa and the Middle East. She has extensively covered the civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo, police brutality and poverty in South Africa, and gender-based violence around the world. Jordan joined Newsweek in 2024 after leaving The Evening Standard and has worked at Metro. co. uk in the past. She graduated from Kingston University and also worked in documentaries. Jordan can be reached by emailing j. king@newsweek. com. Languages: English.