Voters in Germany's Brandenburg cast ballots in tight race
Voters in the eastern German state of Brandenburg are casting ballots on Sunday in a closely watched election, with the country waiting to see whether the far right will secure the most support for the second time in a month, or if the Social Democrats (SPD) will come out on top.
The SPD is the party of the beleaguered Chancellor Olaf Scholz, but also of Brandenburg's popular state leader, Dietmar Woidke.
Brandenburg, which surrounds the German capital of Berlin but doesn't include the city, is the only state in former communist East Germany to be continually ruled since 1990 by the SPD, although it has governed in coalitions with different parties.
Woidke, an affable 62-year-old agricultural engineer, has had the state's top job for the last 11 years.
Partly thanks to Woidke's personal popularity, the SPD has closed a gap of about five to six percentage points in the polls with the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party and made it a neck-and-neck race.
The AfD is classified by the domestic intelligence agency in Brandenburg as a suspected right-wing extremist group.
Woidke on Sunday said his party had entered the elections "more united and more decided" because its members were aware that a lot was at stake.
He said attempts by others to cast the election as a referrendum on Scholz's government are "not paying off," and have underestimated the intelligence of voters in the state.
The AfD's top candidate, Hans-Christoph Berndt, countered that his party is far stronger now than when the last state parliament was elected in 2019.
Berndt said while casting his ballot on Sunday that an AfD victory in Brandenburg would be a "clear sign of hope" to the country, and vowed that "things will get better in Germany" if the party receives a further boost.
A poll released on Thursday by public broadcaster ZDF showed the AfD at 28%, with the SPD pulling 27% of the vote. In an earlier poll from another public broadcaster ARD, the far-right party was at 28% to the SPD's 26-27%.
The ZDF poll showed the Christian Democrats (CDU), which are the main opposition party on the federal level, winning 14% in Brandenburg while a new populist party, the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW) stood at 13%.
That party, which entered the political scene only a few months ago, did very well in its first elections in Thuringia and Saxony on September 1.
It combines left-wing social policy with a hardline anti-immigration and anti-Ukraine funding stance.
A strong showing for the AfD and the BSW would be unwelcome news for Scholz, with his polling numbers ebbing just a year before national elections.
Other parties refuse cooperation with AfD
If the AfD proves to be the top vote-winner in Brandenburg, it would be the second time since the Nazi era that a far-right party has won the most support in a state-level election. On September 1, the AfD got more votes than any other party in Thuringia.
But in Germany's electoral system, the winner of the popular vote doesn't always govern the state. The system requires parties to either win an outright majority - which is rare - or make compromises with rival parties and agree to govern together.
So far parties have refused to do that with the AfD. This means that even if it gets more support than its rivals, the party will not be in power but relegated to the opposition.
The five former East German states are seen as the stronghold of far-right support, although the political landscape does differ between them.
What the eastern states do have in common is the two top issues for voters, namely migration and jobs.
Bold political gamble
State Premier Woidke has tried to distance himself from the unpopular chancellor and has mainly avoided making campaign appearances with Scholz - and this despite the fact that the chancellor not only lives in Potsdam, the state capital, but also quite close to the government building where Woidke works.
Woidke has put his neck on the line by insisting that, if the SPD does not place first in the election, he will no longer lead the Brandenburg government as state premier.
Many view this as a ploy to get the rank and file out to the polls, but it is not without risk.
Still, even without Woidke, if the polls are accurate, there appear to be various ways a first- or second-placed SPD could cobble together a government.
However the results play out, the state is unlikely to have a new government for many weeks, if not months.
Some 2.1 million voters are eligible to cast their ballots. The Potsdam state parliament typically has 88 seats, but under Germany's electoral system, which accounts for overhang and compensation mandates, the total can rise to as many as 110.
