The local SPD club stacked a lot of handkerchiefs on the high table of its election stand in the center of Unterhaching this Thursday afternoon. “Don’t cry, choose!” is written on the packaging. After many elections in previous years, the Social Democrats must have had to use their own advertising media to dry tears. This time you think you won’t need them on Sunday for that. Everything suddenly feels very different. So nothing to cry about. The mood is relaxed, there is a lot of laughter, including with passers-by. They actually grab it when the campaigners offer them flyers. You come up with specific questions. You want to get to know the candidate. And then someone else cycles by who shouts: “Long live the SPD!”
Can this be? Volker Panzer, once the second mayor of Unterhaching, and now 80 years old, is amazed to see: “That I can still experience that.” For some of the people who are promoting the Social Democrats here at the stand, this kind of encouragement is a completely new experience. “You hardly know how to react,” says Ramona Greiner, who heads the campaign team. The party is on the up and with it its own candidate. Korbinian Rüger, who was given little chance at the beginning of the election campaign in direct comparison with CSU man Florian Hahn and the Green Anton Hofreiter, is suddenly considered the third possible winner in the Munich-Land constituency. A recent survey found all three close together. It also feels as if anything is still possible, confirm the election campaigners in the Unterhaching pedestrian zone.
“Is that him?” Asks an elderly lady, who approaches the stand with the red parasol. Yes, that’s him, Korbinian Rüger, the man from the poster in front of the town hall square. He is now recognized, although three months ago hardly anyone outside the party could do anything with the name of the 32-year-old university lecturer from Planegg. “It was right to post a lot early on in all the communities,” said Greiner.
But Rüger was also extremely hard-working, discussed at many events and rang the doorbell at around 5,000 front doors to introduce himself and his topics. “He is turned towards, happy and at the same time so calm that the spark leaps over”, describes the state parliament member Natascha Kohnen the candidate. She explains the success with the people, the sympathy that is shown to him: “You can tell that he does it out of conviction.”
How else should you go into an election campaign where everyone says you won’t get into the Bundestag anyway? Not even above the list, because Rüger is not on it at all. If you want him to represent the district in Berlin in the future, you have to give him the first vote. He explains that to people in conversation. Many do not even know that. And some can be convinced. From his style, his argumentation, also from his age. “There are many who want a young MP,” said Kohnen.
“Yes, it was a pretty hopeless fight,” Rüger admits. But although he does not want to give too much to said survey, he also feels how the curve has gone up for the SPD and for him. He is pleased that the election campaign in the district is now seen as a three-way battle. The conversations with the voters are often very positive, he reports. The people express their sympathy for him. After getting to know each other, some even regret having already chosen. It was the same when I met a couple from Sauerlach. That had already filled out the postal voting papers when it spoke to Rüger. “A few days later they wrote me an email that they had thrown the documents away and applied for new ones. They then voted for me,” says Rüger, and you can tell how pleased he was.
Such experiences give him further motivation. Just like the statement of an acquaintance of his election campaign manager who, although not able to vote in the district, often passes his posters and thinks: “He not only looks good, you also want to talk to him.” This was also the case with the senior citizens who came into conversation with Rüger at the Unterhachinger Radl-Ambulanz. It became clear: They like the candidate. And he has something to say. About justice, about climate change, about minimum wages, a lot about Europe.
The new affiliation with the SPD also has a lot to do with the candidates for chancellor. “You have noticed that especially since Laschet laughed at the flood disaster,” says Greiner. From this point on, people increasingly approached their party, informed themselves about Olaf Scholz and what the SPD had to say. Their candidates were increasingly interesting. “There was a brief Schulz hype at the last election. But I’ve never seen anything like this at information booths,” she says. And the handkerchiefs? Local association chairwoman Sabine Schmierl is confident: “We’ll save them for tears of joy.”