Alternative for Germany, AfD, has won a historic result in Saxony-Anhalt's state election, increasing pressure on Chancellor Friedrich Merz's Government.
According to the provisional final result, the party received 43.8%, more than double its 20.8% share in 2021 and its strongest performance in a German state election.
The Christian Democratic Union finished far behind on 17.2%, its worst result in the state's history.
AfD won 39 of the state parliament's 83 seats, three short of the 42 needed for an absolute majority.
The reversal is substantial: in 2021 the CDU won 37.1% and AfD finished second. Five years later, their gap exceeded 26 percentage points in AfD's favour.
Other parties remained in single figures: the SPD received 9.3%, the Greens 8.9%, the Left 8.6% and the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance, BSW, 5.3%.
The FDP, on 2.6%, failed to cross the parliamentary threshold.
Difficult coalition arithmetic
Despite the victory, AfD cannot govern alone.
State leader Ulrich Siegmund described the result as a clear mandate and announced contacts with parties and individual MPs.
BSW's five seats could be decisive. Together, AfD and BSW would have 44 seats, but no governing agreement had been reached.
Excluding AfD could require an exceptionally difficult coalition of every other party that entered parliament.
Merz ruled out CDU cooperation with AfD and acknowledged that the result had shaken his party to its foundations.
He said he would not resign or change the Government's basic policy direction.
Why the result matters
The scale of AfD's victory, rather than first place alone, gives it national significance.
Its vote more than doubled while the CDU fell from 37.1% to 17.2%.
For the first time, AfD is within three seats of governing a state outright, despite the traditional parties' policy of political isolation.
The result tests the firewall against working with AfD. A government excluding it could require five parties to cooperate.
It also strengthens AfD's national ambitions and reflects deep dissatisfaction with established parties, particularly in eastern Germany.
AfD's principal positions
The party sits on the right to far right of Germany's political spectrum.
It seeks sharply reduced immigration, tighter border controls and more deportations of people without a legal right to remain.
It supports what it calls remigration, returning foreign nationals to their countries of origin under specified conditions.
It opposes further EU political integration and wants powers returned to member states.
AfD opposes German arms deliveries to Ukraine, seeks an end to sanctions on Russia and supports restoring economic and energy ties with Moscow.
It challenges current climate policies, calling for the removal of measures it says burden households and industry, and supports a return to nuclear energy.
The party promotes traditional family positions and opposes many policies concerning gender and sexual identity.
It also emphasises domestic security, stronger policing, tougher sentences and action against crime.
Saxony-Anhalt's constitutional-protection service has classified the regional AfD organisation as right-wing extremist. The party rejects the classification and says it is used politically to exclude it.
The result is a state-election victory, not a national election win.
The central question is whether AfD can now secure control of a German state government for the first time.
