The Alternative for Germany party, or AfD, has campaigned hard against refugees streaming into the country, mostly from Syria and Iraq, and it has surged in public opinion polls from about 3% last summer to as high as 20% ahead of elections in three of Germany’s 16 states. That is far above the 4.7% the AfD won in the 2013 federal election just half a year after it was formed mainly to oppose Europe’s single currency, the euro, and the expensive European Union financial bailouts to Greece.
Political leaders across the board say there is zero chance of the AfD taking power in the states of Baden-Wuerttemberg, Rhineland-Palatinate or Saxony-Anhalt because the other four mainstream parties running in those states have vowed to reject any kind of a coalition with it. Still, the AfD’s projected electoral triumphs have upset the political establishment in Germany.
The party’s success could give Merkel a black eye in the most important German elections this year ahead of the 2017 federal election. It may also make it harder for the other parties to pull together 50% of the seats in the state assemblies to form working coalitions after the bellwether vote.
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