2024-02-11 21:11:14
The federal election was repeated in parts of the German capital. Half a million Berliners were called upon to cast their vote.
Berliners have been asked to go to the ballot box again.
Emmanuele Contini / Imago
Apart from minor incidents, everything went well. After the federal election in 2021, which was partially unsuccessful, Berliners eligible to vote were asked again this Sunday. Although the result has only limited significance, it is likely to be registered with the federal parties. In the partial repeat of the federal election in Berlin, the federal trend came through: gains for the CDU and AfD, losses for the traffic light parties SPD and FDP and only a small loss for the Greens.
The results lead to a reduction in the size of Parliament by one seat, which was previously held by the FDP. In the future, there will still be 735 members of the Bundestag, including only 91 from the FDP, as the Federal Returning Officer announced on Monday night. For the other parties, the bottom line is that the number of seats remains unchanged. However, compared to 2021, the Greens and the Free Democrats also lost 0.1 percentage points. The CDU and AfD each received 0.1 percentage points more.
After counting almost all votes (99.9 percent), the SPD remains the strongest party in the capital with 22.3 percent (-1.2 percentage points), closely followed by the Greens with 22.0 percent (-0.3). The CDU improved to 17.2 percent (+1.3), the Left practically maintained its result from the 2021 election at 11.5 percent (+0.1). The AfD climbs to 9.4 percent (+1.0) and pushes past the FDP, which falls to 8.1 percent (-0.9).
There were no changes in the 12 Bundestag direct mandates that are up for grabs in the capital: SPD 4, Greens and CDU 3 each and Left 2. Former Prime Minister Michael Müller (SPD) defended his direct mandate particularly narrowly. SPD General Secretary Kevin Kühnert, former Minister of State for Culture Monika Grütters (CDU) and Green Party politician Stefan Gelbhaar also achieved this in particularly exciting constituencies.
In the Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf constituency, Governing Mayor Michael Müller from the SPD was able to narrowly defend his direct mandate against Federal Family Minister Lisa Paus. In Treptow-Köpenick, left-wing politician Gregor Gysi retains his direct mandate.
CDU politician Thomas Heilmann once again won the direct mandate for the Steglitz-Zehlendorf constituency. In the overall result of the first votes, it increased by 0.6 points to 28.6 percent compared to 2021, as can be seen from the state election authority’s website.
Almost half a million citizens were called to vote
Around 550,000 citizens – a fifth of those eligible to vote – were called upon to cast their votes. However, the majority of the traffic light coalition under Chancellor Olaf Scholz is not in danger.
It wasn’t entirely without a hitch: According to the state returning officer Stephan Bröchler, a key was missing from a polling station in the Pankow district on Sunday to open a locked room with the voting documents. The electoral board had apparently neglected to receive the key from the local daycare center. Only after documents were delivered from the district could the restaurant open at 8:40 a.m. with a delay of 40 minutes.
The voter turnout was rather low. At 4 p.m., voter turnout was 54.1 percent of eligible voters. This means the turnout is lower than at this point in the 2021 main election.
Bankruptcies led to new elections
The election in September 2021 took place at the same time as the Berlin Marathon, so complications arose. In many places, ballot papers were missing or incorrect ones were issued. The result was long queues. Voting took place in numerous polling stations well after 6 p.m., the official end of the election, while the first forecasts were already running.
According to a ruling by the Berlin Constitutional Court, the election to the Berlin House of Representatives, the regional parliament, has already been repeated in February 2023. As a result, the CDU succeeded in appointing the governing mayor for the first time in twenty years. The Christian Democrat Kai Wegner formed an alliance with the SPD and replaced the red-red-green coalition.
455 of 2256 Berlin electoral districts are re-voting
The Federal Constitutional Court also ordered a repeat of the national election in 455 of 2,256 electoral districts. It is conceivable that after the repeat election, individual Berlin MPs will lose their mandate and new candidates will move into the Bundestag.
The election is not representative of the capital due to the uneven distribution of the affected polling stations. In the Pankow district, around 85 percent of the electoral districts are affected, but in neighboring Lichtenberg only 2.9 percent are affected.
There may not be any previous projections and forecasts, as no significant changes are expected for the 2021 federal election.
The same candidates as in 2021 must run for the repeat election in Berlin. However, the electorate has changed since then. There are also new voters who have turned 18 in the meantime and are therefore eligible to vote. German citizens who moved to Berlin after September 2021 and live in one of the affected voting districts are now also eligible to vote. However, anyone who has moved and no longer lives in one of the affected districts of the capital is not allowed to vote again.
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