2024 Brandenburg state election

2024 Brandenburg state election

← 2019 22 September 2024 Next →
All 88 seats of the Landtag of Brandenburg 45 seats needed for a majority
Turnout	1,513,638 (72.9%) 11.6 pp
First party Second party   Leader Dietmar Woidke Hans-Christoph Berndt Party SPD AfD Last election 25 seats, 26.2% 23 seats, 23.5% Seats won 32 30 Seat change 7 7 Popular vote 463,678 438,811 Percentage 30.9% 29.2% Swing 4.7 pp 5.7 pp   Third party Fourth party   Leader Robert Crumbach Jan Redmann Party BSW CDU Last election Did not exist 15 seats, 15.6% Seats won 14 12 Seat change 14 3 Popular vote 202,343 181,632 Percentage 13.5% 12.1% Swing New party 3.5 pp
Winning candidates in the single-member constituencies.
Government before election Third Woidke cabinet SPD–CDU–Green Government after election TBD

The election to the state parliament Landtag of Brandenburg of 22 September 2024 was the third state election within Germany in the month of September 2024, three weeks after the state elections in Thuringia and in Saxony, all part of former East Germany.^[1][2][3][4] The outgoing government was a black-red-green "flag of Kenya" coalition consisting of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and The Greens, led by Minister-President Dietmar Woidke of the SPD.

Despite polling showing them consistently trailing in second place, the SPD, which has governed Brandenburg since its 1990 re-establishment, remained the largest party with a five percentage point swing in its favour. The Alternative for Germany gained six points and won 29% of the vote. The Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance (BSW) debuted at 13.5%, followed by the CDU which declined to 12%. The outgoing government narrowly lost its majority as the Greens collapsed and fell short of the 5% electoral threshold, losing all their seats. The Left also suffered major losses and fell out of the Landtag, as did the Free Voters. The FDP, which had won 9.3 % of the vote in the 2021 German federal election in Brandenburg, fell to 0.8 % of the vote, their worst result in any state election ever, eclipsing the 0.9 % of the vote in Saxony two weeks prior.

The 2019 Brandenburg state election had resulted in the formation of the third Woidke cabinet, a "Kenya" coalition of the SPD, CDU, and Greens. The SPD remained the strongest party with small losses, just ahead of the AfD, which became the second largest party on a large swing. The CDU and The Left each recorded significant losses. The Greens achieved their best result to date with almost 11%. BVB/Free Voters improved to 5.0%. The FDP remained below the electoral threshold with 4.1% and did not win seats.

The SPD has governed Brandenburg continuously since the first post-reunification election in 1990. In the 2021 German federal election, the party won all 10 federal constituencies across the state.

The Brandenburg election was the third in a string of elections in Eastern Germany in September 2024, each of which saw a strong performance for the far-right AfD. In Thuringia the party became the largest in a state parliament for the first time; it also recorded its best result to date in Saxony. The parties involved in the federal Scholz government also suffered losses in each. The performance of Woidke's SPD in Brandenburg was considered a key test of Chancellor Olaf Scholz's leadership. The Brandenburg SPD campaigned on Woidke's personal popularity; Woidke pledged to resign if the SPD did not remain the largest party, encouraging tactical voting to deny AfD first place. He also received an unusual endorsement from the Minister-President of Saxony, Michael Kretschmer of CDU, who stated "the strongest party needs to be a democratic party".^[5][6]

The SPD secured a victory, increasing both its popular vote percentage and the amount of seats held.^[5][7] Nonetheless, the two largest populist parties – the left-wing^[8] BSW^[9] and the far-right AfD^[10] – earned significant results, combining for precisely half of all the seats in the legislature. The Greens, the Left and the BVB/Free Voters faced a complete defeat, losing all of their seats. Finally, the FDP fell to less than 1% of the vote.

Overall, the outgoing coalition between the SPD, the CDU and the Greens earned 47.1% of the vote in a decline compared to their combined total of 52.6% of the vote in the 2019 election.^[11]

Party		Party-list				Constituency				Total seats	+/–
		Votes	%	+/–	Seats	Votes	%	+/–	Seats
	Social Democratic Party	463,678	30.89	4.70	13	500,923	33.57	7.75	19	32	7
	Alternative for Germany	438,811	29.23	5.72	5	470,412	31.52	9.37	25	30	7
	Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance	202,343	13.48	New	14					14	New
	Christian Democratic Union	181,632	12.10	3.47	12	238,247	15.97	1.49	0	12	3
	Alliance 90/The Greens	62,031	4.13	6.65	0	51,373	3.44	6.86	0	0	10
	The Left	44,692	2.98	7.74	0	77,123	5.17	7.01	0	0	10
	BVB/Free Voters	38,596	2.57	0.19	0	104,722	7.02	2.48	0	0	5
	Animal Protection Party	30,032	2.00	0.60	0	3,758	0.25	0.25	0	0	–
	Plus Brandenburg	13,577	0.90	0.36	0	8,900	0.60	0.48	0	0	–
	Free Democratic Party	12,462	0.83	3.25	0	20,389	1.37	2.28	0	0	–
	German Rural Economy	6,619	0.44	New	0	4,536	0.30	New	0	0	–
	Values Union	3,877	0.26	New	0					0	–
	Third Way	1,810	0.12	New	0	756	0.05	New	0	0	–
	German Communist Party	1,028	0.07	New	0	743	0.05	0.01	0	0	–
	Grassroots Democratic Party					394	0.03	New	0	0	–
	Democrats BB					800	0.05	New	0	0	–
	Die PARTEI					222	0.01	0.51	–	0	–
	Other					8,939	0.60		–	0	–
Total		1,501,188	100.00	–	44	1,492,237	100.00	–	44	88	–
Valid votes		1,501,188	99.18			1,492,237	98.59
Invalid/blank votes		12,450	0.82			21,401	1.41
Total votes		1,513,638	100.00			1,513,638	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		2,076,953	72.88	11.55		2,076,953	72.88
Source: Wahlen Brandenburg

• 
  SPD vote
• 
  AfD vote
• 
  BSW vote
• 
  CDU vote
• 
  Green vote
• 
  Linke vote
• 
  BVB-FW vote
• 
  Turnout

Immediate reaction to the results focused on the successful use of tactical voting to deny AfD first place, and the SPD closing the large gap in pre-election polling as a result. The ARD exit poll found that 75 percent of SPD voters and 59 percent of CDU voters agreed with the statement "I was not convinced by the party, but I'm voting for it to prevent a strong AfD".^[13]

This was the worst result for CDU in any state election in the east. Lead candidate Jan Redmann was critical of what he called Woidke's "AfD or me" campaign tactics, arguing that it only served to depress the vote share of the other mainstream parties and did not dissuade anyone from voting for AfD.^[14][15] As well, state party leaders criticized CDU Minister-President Michael Kretschmer of Saxony's endorsement of Woidke in the run-up to the election; general secretary Gordon Hoffmann called the endorsement "uncooperative" while Redmann stated it was "completely unhelpful" and disappointed CDU campaigners.^[16] The CDU campaign was also damaged by Redmann's arrest for drunk driving in Potsdam in mid-July. He was stopped driving an electric scooter with a blood alcohol content of 1.28 per mille (0.128%), well above the 0.5 legal limit and also past the limit of 1.1 where the offense becomes a crime with a potential prison sentence instead of only a fine. Despite questions about his fitness for office, he remained their lead candidate.^[17][18]

This was also the worst result for FDP in any state, federal or European election in the party's history. Its total of 12,462 party-list votes, a share of 0.8%, barely eclipsed the 12,450 invalid party-list votes. FDP federal leader Christian Lindner blamed the poor result on the "tactical situation" and the unpopularity of the federal traffic light coalition, not on lead candidate Zyon Braun or any of the campaign.^[19]

The seat distribution was in doubt for part of election night, as Brandenburg has a version of the "basic mandate clause" (Grundmandatsklausel) where all parties winning at least one constituency seat are granted full proportional representation according to their share of party-list votes. Both Green MP Marie Schäffer and BVB-FW leader Péter Vida were competitive in their respective constituencies in Potsdam and Barnim, though neither ultimately won; their parties lost all of their seats as a result. The Left failed to pass the five-percent electoral threshold and also lost its seats, marking the first time the party is not represented in a state parliament in the former East Germany.^[20]

Dietmar Woidke lost his constituency seat Spree-Neiße I, which he had represented since 2009, to the AfD candidate Steffen Kubitzki by a margin of seven votes. As all leading candidates are also first on their party's list, Woidke instead fills one of SPD's thirteen list seats.^[21]

With more than one-third of seats, AfD has a "blocking minority" (Sperrminorität) that allows it to veto certain parliamentary actions requiring a two-thirds majority, even if it is not in government. In Brandenburg, this includes the selection of constitutional court judges and approval of state constitutional amendments.^[20]

On 25 September, the joint leaders of Alliance 90/The Greens, Omid Nouripour and Ricarda Lang, announced their resignations after poor results in the three eastern state elections. After the Greens entered all of them as part of the respective governing coalitions, it was wiped out in Brandenburg and Thuringia, while it received only 5.1% of the party-list vote in Saxony to narrowly retain representation.^[22]

The incumbent "Kenya coalition" is no longer possible. With an SPD-CDU coalition one seat short of a majority, and all parties having ruled out working with AfD, the only two mathematically possible majority coalitions are that of SPD and BSW or SPD, BSW and CDU. SPD general secretary Kevin Kühnert confirmed the day after the election that coalition talks would take place with BSW.^[23]

In a press conference at SPD headquarters in Berlin later on 23 September, Woidke announced he was inviting both BSW and CDU to begin exploratory talks. BSW leader Robert Crumbach would not commit to participating in government and suggested the SPD-CDU minority government would be workable. CDU leaders, however, ruled out any participation in government in view of their party's poor results. Hoffmann reacted skeptically to the invitation: "To be honest, I don't know what there is to discuss in these talks...we have no mandate to govern."^[24][25]

Exploratory talks between SPD and BSW began on 1 October, with a second round occurring the following week. Woidke described good progress but emphasized that "exploratory talks are exploratory talks. The decision is made at the end." The SPD state executive committee scheduled a meeting at the end of the month to potentially consider a recommendation to move forward with negotiations.^[26][27] On 28 October, both parties presented an exploratory paper and reached an agreement on the issue of peace, clearing the way for coalition negotiations to begin.^[28]

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• Politics of Brandenburg