The head of the election commission in the state of Saxony-Anhalt, located in eastern Germany, reported that the participation rate in the current version of these elections reached 34.7% today (September 6, 2026) by 12 noon. At the same time during the 2021 elections, the participation rate reached about 22.4%, reaching 60.3% at the end of it, including voting by mail. The head of the Election Commission expects the preliminary final results to be issued early Monday morning.
The 2,130 polling centers in the state receive voters until six in the evening, which is also the same time as the deadline for submitting voting cards by mail.
About 1.7 million citizens who have reached the age of eighteen are entitled to participate in this ballot. The head of the committee explained that the electoral process was running smoothly during the morning without any obstacles, stressing that there were no “disproportionate waiting times” before the committees.
The far-right Alternative Party is expected to win, and if achieved, it will be the first success for this party in gaining power at the state level.
From 're-displacement' to home schooling
The Alternative for Germany party, which is expected to win these elections, was founded in response to the euro crisis, but its focus has clearly shifted to the far right. His hardline anti-immigration stance, which developed during the European migration crisis in 2015 and 2016, has become the party's most prominent issue today. He is seen as having capitalized on years of anxiety among many German voters about the large numbers of refugees seeking asylum in the country from war-torn countries such as Syria and Ukraine.
His platform in the last general election called for the imposition of controls on the country's borders and 'repatriation', a term used among the far right to refer to the forced resettlement of migrants outside Germany.
The party was founded in 2013 by skeptics of the feasibility of the euro. It is strongly critical of the European Union and believes in nationalist pride in German history and culture. However, the party did not explicitly call for withdrawal from the European bloc in its program for the German Parliament (Bundestag) elections in 2025.
Pro-Kremlin party?
Regarding Russia, the AfD's position is widely seen as more pro-Kremlin than any other major party. The party criticized the sanctions imposed on Moscow over its war against Ukraine, and called for the resumption of Russian gas purchases and an end to arms supplies to Kiev. Like many parties, the Alternative for Germany party is not homogeneous and includes several factions. The party's leader in the eastern state of Thuringia, Björn Höcke, was judicially convicted for using a banned Nazi slogan. In the neighboring state of Saxony-Anhalt, the party's main candidate, Ulrich Zigmund, takes a more moderate tone, but his platform is also highly controversial.
A strict program of ten priorities
Before today's elections in Saxony-Anhalt, the Alternative Party received more than 40% in opinion polls. The party outlined a 10-point plan for priorities during the first 100 days in power, pledging to allocate separate classes for children of asylum seekers, ban rainbow flags in schools, cancel contracts with the regional public broadcaster MDR, reduce the number of ministries in the state, and create a committee to investigate the handling of the Corona virus pandemic. Other pledges include allowing children to be home-schooled, halting the construction of wind turbines, and creating a task force to speed up deportations.
The party's program in Saxony-Anhalt also supports its adoption of family structures based on marriage between a man and a woman, which reveals tensions between the party in the state and the party at the federal level, as the party's co-chair Alice Weidel is in a relationship with a same-sex partner. The Alternative for Germany party's policies will have real impacts on the daily lives of the state's 2.1 million residents, but it is still unclear how many policies can actually be implemented in the face of expected opposition in the courts and the German federal government.
In the German federal system, state governments have significant powers in the areas of health care, education, cultural affairs and media, while the federal government in Berlin retains exclusive authority in foreign affairs, defence, taxation and immigration.
