Germany’s Far-Right AfD Wins Big In Local Elections, Piling Pressure on Ruling Coalition 

Germany’s Alternative for Germany (AfD) scored major gains in Sunday’s municipal elections in the country’s most populous state, even as Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s conservatives finished first in the polls, a result that analysts say underscores the far-right party’s growing popularity, the Associated Press reported Monday. 

Final results released Monday showed Merz’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) won 33.3 percent of the vote in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW), a western state home to 18 million people.  

The center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) – a coalition partner in Merz’s conservative-led administration – garnered around 22 percent. 

Both parties saw a drop in support compared with the 2020 elections, particularly for the SPD, as NRW was long considered a party stronghold. 

Meanwhile, the AfD came in third with 14.5 percent – up 9.4 points from the 2020 elections – with party co-leader Alice Weidel hailing the outcome as “a huge success.”  

The results in NRW were the first test for Merz’s ruling coalition that formed a few months after Germany held early general elections in February. The CDU led that race, but the AfD finished second with 20.8 percent of the vote and became the largest opposition party. 

Analysts explained that the AfD’s popularity surge is due to voter frustration over immigration, a stagnant economy, and the ongoing war in Ukraine. This surge has continued despite Germany’s domestic intelligence agency initially classifying the party as a right-wing extremist organization. 

It later suspended the designation after the AfD challenged it in court. 

Since taking office in May, Merz’s administration has tightened migration policies and sought to revive the economy but has drawn criticism for internal rifts. Political scientist Stefan Marschall noted that the far-right party “is in a position to organize the discontent” with the traditional mainstream parties. 

Following the election outcome, Merz wrote on X that his CDU remained “clearly the strongest force” in NRW, adding that “solutions are not on the fringe, but in the center.” 

The AfD’s rise reflects broader momentum for far-right movements across Europe, which are not only gaining electorally but also pressing legal battles against European institutions.

The Patriots for Europe, a bloc that includes France’s Marine Le Pen and Hungary’s Viktor Orbán, is fighting rulings by the European Parliament and the European Union’s party oversight organization that cut it off from more than $4.7 million in funding over alleged misspending, Politico added. 

In two lawsuits, the Patriots accuse Parliament of bias and discrimination, claiming that similar campaigns by other parties were reimbursed.  

Last week, the European Court of Justice annulled a $55,000 sanction against the party, bolstering its case.  

Patriots officials said they will pursue further claims and are preparing to fight fresh efforts by the Parliament’s Budgetary Control Committee to recover around $5 million linked to alleged irregularities by Identity and Democracy, a defunct far-right group.