Far-Right Biggest Winner in German Vote09/15 06:14

   

   BERLIN (AP) -- Chancellor Friedrich Merz's party finished first in municipal 
polls in Germany's most populous state, but the biggest winner in the first 
electoral test since Merz's government took power was the far-right Alternative 
for Germany, which nearly tripled its showing compared with five years ago.

   Final results Monday showed that Merz's center-right Christian Democratic 
Union took 33.3% of the vote in Sunday's elections for councils and mayors in 
North Rhine-Westphalia, a western region that is home to about 18 million 
people. Its partners in a national government that so far has failed to lift 
the country's mood, the center-left Social Democrats -- for whom the state was 
long a reliable heartland -- took 22.1%.

   Both were slightly below their score in the last municipal elections, in 
2020. But Alternative for Germany, or AfD, took 14.5% of the vote -- a gain of 
9.4% points. The anti-immigration AfD is strongest in the formerly communist 
and less prosperous east, but Sunday's showing underlined its arrival in recent 
years as a force in western Germany too.

   In Germany's national election in February, AfD took 20.8% of the vote to 
finish second and become the largest opposition party. In North 
Rhine-Westphalia, it took 16.8% in February.

   AfD co-leader Alice Weidel celebrated what she called "a huge success" on 
Sunday.

   AfD's rise has been fueled by discontent over large numbers of migrants but 
also other issues, including a stagnant economy and the war in Ukraine. Its 
support has remained high despite Germany's domestic intelligence agency 
classifying it as a right-wing extremist organization, a designation that it 
suspended after AfD launched a legal challenge.

   Its success in February followed the collapse of a center-left national 
government that had become notorious for squabbling. Merz's conservative-led 
administration, which took office in May, has taken a tougher approach to 
migration and is trying to revitalize the economy, but also has drawn 
unfavorable attention for internal disagreements.

   Stefan Marschall, a political science professor at Duesseldorf's Heinrich 
Heine University, said that AfD "is in a position to organize the discontent" 
with the traditional mainstream parties.

   "It succeeded in that, particularly in the regions that feel left behind," 
he told Phoenix television. He noted that AfD didn't even field candidates 
everywhere on Sunday, which meant that its support was "somewhat underrated" by 
the outcome.

   In three of the less prosperous cities in the industrial Ruhr region, AfD 
mayoral candidates garnered enough support to advance to runoff votes on Sept. 
28 against candidates from mainstream parties. AfD contenders will face Social 
Democrats in Gelsenkirchen and Duisburg, and a Christian Democrat in Hagen.

   Merz wrote on social network X that his CDU is "clearly the strongest force" 
in North Rhine-Westphalia. "We are addressing the problems at national, state 
and municipal level with determination," he said. "The solutions are not on the 
fringe, but in the center -- with answers for our economy, migration and 
security."

   The biggest drop in support on Sunday was for the environmentalist, 
left-leaning Greens, who fell to 13.5% from 20% five years ago. The Greens are 
now in opposition nationally after ex-Chancellor Olaf Scholz's unpopular 
government collapsed, but they're part of a state government in North 
Rhine-Westphalia that is led by conservative governor Hendrik Wst, a prominent 
figure in Merz's party. That government wasn't up for election Sunday.