German chancellor alarmed after AfD elects first state parliament speaker

Chancellor Friedrich Merz expressed deep concern on Wednesday after the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) won its first state parliament speaker post, securing a key role in Saxony-Anhalt.

“I am deeply concerned and somewhat appalled by what happened yesterday,” Merz said in his address at a business forum of the Handelsblatt Media Group in Berlin. He called on democratic politicians to keep refusing any cooperation with the anti-immigrant party.

“It was a secret ballot. We do not know exactly who cast votes for the AfD candidate,” Merz said. “But anyone who casts their vote for the AfD is playing the extremists' game. And they are destroying credibility. It is certainly incompatible with the values of my party, the CDU.”

Lawmakers in Magdeburg on Tuesday elected Tobias Rausch of the AfD as speaker of the state parliament. In a secret first-round ballot, he won 48 of 82 votes, nine more than the 39 seats held by his own party.

German media and rival parties speculated that some lawmakers from Merz's conservative CDU cast those votes, and read the result as a crack in the long-standing firewall against the AfD, the policy of no coalitions, no joint votes and no other cooperation meant to isolate the party.

Germany's state domestic intelligence agency in Saxony-Anhalt has classified the AfD there as a confirmed right-wing extremist group, citing suspected anti-democratic goals and activities. The party is challenging the label.

Merz expressed concern over Tuesday’s result in Magdeburg, but also warned against hasty conclusions. He suggested lawmakers outside the CDU could have backed the AfD candidate in the secret ballot to raise pressure on his party and open divisions.

“False-flag operations don't just happen in the military; they happen in politics, too,” he said. “And that is why we need to be careful about drawing hasty conclusions. Here, we are dealing with at least two -- or in the Saxony-Anhalt state parliament, three -- factions that are doing everything they can to undermine democratic cohesion”

Merz said the results of September's regional election in Saxony-Anhalt had been a bitter outcome and a historic turning point, with the anti-immigrant AfD winning 43.8% of the vote and the left-wing populist BSW 5.3%. Calling them extremist parties with authoritarian tendencies, he said it was deeply concerning that the two had reached an absolute majority in the state parliament.

"Yet the election result is the election result," he said, adding that accepting results, even when they are unwelcome, is part of democracy.

"The question then turns back to us: what do we do so that something like this is not repeated?" Merz said. "Above all, so that it does not happen across the whole of Germany at the next federal election."

He said the parties in the governing coalition will draw lessons from the setback, continue the reform program and deliver concrete results to address people's concerns.