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AfD party chairwoman Alice Weidel celebrated Sunday’s provisional results, with the right-wing populists set to gain ground in both states and most likely to become Hesse’s second-largest political party.
“Over the years we were able to convince ever more people of our freedom-based politics,” Weidel said on public broadcaster ZDF.
Weidel also thanked supporters online for their “great support” and said the results should send a clear signal to the coalition government in Berlin.
“There can be no ‘as you were’ for the [coalition in Berlin] after these disastrous results,” Weidel wrote on social media. “The citizens of Hesse and Bavaria have made it clear that they have had enough of disenfranchisement, dispossession and of a migration policy that can be justified by nothing.”
Quite what Weidel meant to refer to with words like “dispossession” is not entirely clear — but the AfD has been highly critical, for example, of climate-based policies that might prompt people to change their heating systems or their cars.
In another post, Weidel said the results were “the bill for [the federal coalition’s] catastrophic policies.”
The AfD is almost certain to take up the role of leaders of the opposition in Hesse, given that they look set to be the second largest party and given that their participation in any coalition is out of the question.
However, in Bavaria, the AfD would only claim that role — which gives a party the first right to reply in debates, for example — if it could finish as the second strongest party. That’s because the Greens, their main contenders for second spot, also appear sure not to feature in any possible coalition in Berlin.
During Angela Merkel’s last term as chancellor, the AfD led the opposition in the federal Bundestag parliament. That position is now held by the CDU/CSU.
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