Of course, they at the AfD knew that it would be a strong result, far better than the ten percent five years ago. But how strong, what is really in it? Anyone who asked party strategists about this in the days before the election heard some reluctance. On the one hand, it was said, the AfD’s inspiring federal trend, the traffic light frustration and the heating law – “a gift for us” so that many voters can express their rebellion to the maximum: with crosses for the AfD. Added to this is the newly ignited discontent over migration, “our core business – great”. On the other hand: There is no such huge dissatisfaction in Bavaria as in East Germany, and there is also the Free Voters with Hubert Aiwanger, who is “stealing our sayings”. 13 percent, it was said later on Sunday, would be “a dream”.
That was probably too deep. It is 6 p.m. sharp in the state parliament, AfD parliamentary group level in the southern building, when clarity emerges. 16 percent is on the screen, in the ZDF forecast, just ahead of the Greens and clearly ahead of the Free Voters. There is no central election party this time. The top candidates Katrin Ebner-Steiner and Martin Böhm have come to the state parliament, the state and parliamentary group leadership – and they are all now hugging each other, forming a big ball, under the cheering sound of employees and guests. Despite the “agitation” of opponents, Markus Söder and even the Federal President, says Ebner-Steiner, “our expectations are exceeded.” The citizens wanted “a change towards a policy for their own people”. Co-leading candidate Böhm promises an evening “full of joy and patriotic thoughts.”
The 16 percent (somewhat varying in later figures) is undoubtedly a strengthening of the AfD in the Free State too. In the course of the evening it will also be decided who will be the opposition leader in the state parliament: Will the AfD actually finish ahead of the Greens? That’s what it looks like. This is relevant when accessing committee chairs, for speaking rights in parliament or for the first counterattack after government statements by the Prime Minister. The second strongest force could therefore be a party that is increasingly being targeted by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution due to suspicion of anti-constitutional efforts.
Aiwanger, Aiwanger, Aiwanger – the name has been heard a lot in the AfD in recent weeks, almost as an obsession. The complaint, even before Aiwanger’s affair over an anti-Semitic leaflet when he was at school, was: The fact that the AfD has now consistently climbed to more than 20 percent in the nationwide surveys, but is far behind in Bavaria, is precisely the reason for the FW “a factor that only exists in Bavaria”. With his speech at the Erdinger heating demonstration that one must “take back democracy,” or with his thesis about common sense being undermined by left-wing elites everywhere, the Vice Prime Minister is seen by many people outside as the opposition, a protest magnet, so to speak , as “AfD light”. But please let that be the role of the original AfD.
In the leaflet affair, waves of solidarity with Aiwanger were felt within the AfD’s own ranks. And tried to counteract it with force. At Gillamoos a few weeks ago, Ebner-Steiner warned supporters: Aiwanger is only playing the opposition, he “has the task of bringing critical voices into the system and neutralizing them there.” At the AfD voting booths, when Aiwanger was mentioned, they tried to portray him as Söder’s “lap dog”, as “Fiffi”, and as a “faller” – for example with the Corona measures, where his FW despite public rumblings in the Cabinet would have supported everything. That obviously worked, as was the election result over the course of the evening; the FW did not soar to the detriment of the AfD.
A double strategy was evident in the AfD’s election campaign: radicalism and camouflage. You had to offer your own supporters something, especially because Söder and Aiwanger were also pushing the migration issue and also calling for a culture war against the Greens. At Gillamoos, Ebner-Steiner called the federal government a “pack” and “anti-German thieves.” And “asylum seekers” only come to collect money and everyone has to leave the country.
In television formats for the general public, on the other hand, the candidates appeared rather tame, and it hardly went beyond the social security funds “plundered” by migrants. This in turn fit with the “normalization strategy”, as an AfD insider calls it – always remaining open to disappointed voters from the CSU and FW. And through local multipliers who support the AfD in clubs, pubs or at work, they “show that we are not as bad” as our political opponents and the media wanted us to believe. “Ordinary people.” According to the results, this must also have worked.
On Monday, the Bavarian AfD leaders are going to Berlin to meet the federal executive board. Chairman Tino Chrupalla will not be there, we hear; after the still mysterious alleged security incident in Ingolstadt. Either way, Ebner-Steiner and Böhm have a result that they can present with pride. On Sunday evening in Munich, Böhm first shouted this sentence: “Let’s get democracy back!”