The AfD Is Rising. Germany’s Political Center Is Failing.

The drubbing in Saxony-Anhalt may be only the beginning. Two more regional elections are scheduled later this month and could demonstrate the growing strength of Germany’s fringe parties and intensify pressure on Merz’s governing coalition in Berlin. 

The center cannot hold

The AfD is more than a political disruptor. German domestic intelligence has classified parts of the party, including its Saxony-Anhalt chapter, as right-wing extremist. Yet the AfD has overtaken the CDU in national polls, while Merz’s approval ratings have fallen to levels unprecedented for a German chancellor.

Although Merz has backtracked on campaign promises, most notably his commitment to uphold the debt brake—loosening the constitutional limit on government borrowing—he has remained resolute in preserving the “firewall” between the CDU and AfD. That firewall is intended to keep Germany anchored in its postwar democracy deliberately constructed with guardrails against its darkest history to prevent backsliding into authoritarianism.

The AfD has used Merz’s flip flop on the debt brake against him and is questioning defense spending on Ukraine.

Upon taking office in May 2025, a little over a year ago, Merz promised to revive Germany’s stagnant economy and increase defense spending to position the country as Europe’s de facto military leader. An antagonistic Russia and an unreliable America have left Germany with few alternatives. German businesses are suffering with high costs, American tariffs and intensifying competition from China.

Merz also made another defining promise: to beat back the AfD and restore the centrist CDU’s  claim to being the true conservative party in Germany. Instead, the election in Saxony-Anhalt will amplify calls, including from within his own party, for him to step aside.

Merz’s blunders over the past year cannot be dismissed as the mistakes of a political novice. He is a seasoned operator who, unlike many of his German peers, has extensive experience in the private sector. He promised an ambitious program of reforms to tackle Germany’s welfare and pension programs, but his proposals were too tepid and too late. And his poor communication style has also overshadowed his efforts on curbing migration and his diplomatic campaign across Europe to sustain support for Ukraine. 

The CDU’s predicament is not surprising. Merz has never been a particularly beloved figure, and the grand coalition between the conservatives and the Social Democratic Party was hardly the outcome German voters desired after the federal election last year. 

After the Federal Republic of Germany was established in 1949, there had been only  single Grand Coalition government during the first four decades. But Merz’s government is the fourth Grand Coalition government in Germany in the last two decades. This coalition, was supposed to be different: it was formed to enact far-reaching reforms and hold the AfD at bay. So far, it has done neither.  

The age of anger

The AfD began in 2013 as a movement of anti-euro skeptics. It has since become a nationwide force, building its constituency through relentless opposition to immigration, nativist appeal and efforts to relativize Germany’s Nazi past. An anemic German economy and frustration with the established parties have accelerated its rise. The AfD is now the leading political party in Germany with support from nearly one-third of German voters. 

Like its far-right counterparts elsewhere in Europe, the AfD has prospered by channeling voters’ anger and grievance. Until now, however, it has remained in opposition. No other German party has been willing to forge a parliamentary coalition with the AfD, and even some European far-right parties consider the AfD so radical that they prefer to keep it at arm’s length. 

The AfD’s victory in Saxony-Anhalt and other upcoming regional elections could change that dynamic. Although the CDU and the AfD hold overlapping positions on migration and some social questions, the AfD’s hostility toward Germany’s culture of historical remembrance is fundamentally incompatible with the country’s center-right tradition.

The CDU’s first leader, Konrad Adenauer, committed Germany to integration with the West—a principle known as Westbindung—that the AfD would dismantle. Merz has steadfastly defended that orientation. The AfD, by contrast, seeks renewed ties with Russia and Germany’s withdrawal from the euro, which it presents as a path to economic revival.

The mood of the country can now be read most clearly in the regional elections, where voters are preoccupied with jobs, immigration, schools and public services. These are precisely the areas in which the grand coalition that Merz leads is coming up short.

The AfD offers a story of national decline but few credible solutions and no meaningful experience of governing. Yet criticizing the AfD is not sufficient for the CDU. The democratic answer to the rise of the AfD must be responsible government, solving complex problems through the institutions and the practices of a healthy democracy. Germany’s response matters beyond its borders.

Across the Atlantic world, Germany's confrontation with extreme nationalist movements is being observed through the light of its history. Germany stands as a reminder of how swiftly democratic norms can erode and an example of a nation that has spent eight decades trying to preserve the lessons of that collapse.

Merz may not be able to revive his personal fortunes, but he can still shape his  legacy by reminding Germans of their particular duty to defend democracy. The most effective answer to the AfD is not moral condemnation alone but competent government and courageous leadership.

Boldness may not win Merz a second term, but it could help arrest the rise of the AfD.