Scholz coalition sees heavy losses in EU elections, German far-right surges

Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s centre left-liberal coalition suffered major losses in European Parliament elections on Sunday, while the far-right Alternative for Germany’s (AfD) votes were at a record high.

Projections by public broadcaster ARD showed Chancellor Scholz’s Social Democratic Party (SPD) could only manage to win 13.9 percent of the vote, down almost 2 percentage points from the last election.

Scholz’s coalition partner the Greens crashed to 11.9 percent, sharply down from the 20.5 percent of the vote it scored five years ago.

The coalition’s junior partner, the liberal Free Democrats (FDP), has been projected to win 5 percent, with a slight fall of 0.4 percent.

The results are widely interpreted as voters' punishment of the coalition government, which saw its popularity dive to an all-time low of 22 percent this month.

The main opposition Christian Democrats (CDU/CSU) won the biggest share of the vote with 30.2 percent, managing to increase their vote modestly from 28.9 percent.

The anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) has been projected to finish second with a record 16 percent of the vote, up from 11 percent in the last election.

Exit polls showed that majority of AfD voters were concerned about their economic welfare and were demanding stronger measures to stop irregular migration.

Some 95 percent of AfD voters said “so many foreigners were coming to Germany,” and 78 percent expressed their fear of “not being able to maintain their standard of living” in the future.

Meanwhile, the newly formed left-wing populist party, Bundnis Sahra Wagenknecht (BSW), managed to win 6.1 percent of the vote in its first European election.

During its election campaign, the BSW sharply criticised Chancellor Scholz and coalition partners for delivering weapons to Ukraine, and called for diplomatic initiatives to end the Russia-Ukraine war.

Initial voter turnout of 65 percent was higher than any of the previous European elections in the country over the last three decades. Germany recently lowered the voting age to 16 for the European Parliament elections to increase young people’s engagement in politics.

Distribution of seats in the European Parliament

According to the projections, the conservative CDU/CSU bloc is set to win 24 of Germany’s 96 seats at the European Parliament.

The far-right AfD, after scoring big gains in the elections, secured almost 16 seats.

Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats were projected to get only 14 seats.

The Greens were set to lose more than half of their seats, and take only 12, after suffering a heavy loss. The liberal FDP has been expected to get around five seats.

Popular left-wing politician Sahra Wagenknecht’s BSW has been projected to win six seats.