SPD candidate Eva Bender wins runoff election for regional president in Hanover

The SPD candidate Eva Bender clearly won the runoff election for the office of regional president in Hanover. After all electoral areas were counted, she received 69.4 percent of the votes, while 30.6 percent voted for the CDU candidate Oliver Junk. This emerged from information on the Hanover region's election website. The results are preliminary.

Bender has been head of education in Hanover since 2024. Junk was mayor of Goslar from 2011 to 2021. In the first round of voting two weeks ago, Bender was ahead with 30.6 percent. At that time, 22.0 percent of voters voted for junk.

Most recently, the regional presidency was held by Steffen Krach, who has since moved to Berlin. The runoff election in the Hanover region was the largest in Lower Saxony on Sunday evening with around 888,000 eligible voters.