A walkout to shield the December vote

On Tuesday, 13 October 2026, the CDU parliamentary group in the Saxony-Anhalt Landtag resolved to leave the plenary chamber during the first two ballots on Ulrich Siegmund (AfD) as state premier, a vote scheduled for 15 December. Fourteen of the group's 15 members backed the party resolution and one abstained, as state chairman and parliamentary group leader Sven Schulze announced. The proposal came from the faction board, and Schulze had earlier said that the accusations against CDU members crossed permissible limits. He also reiterated that CDU support for the AfD candidate is ruled out. Guido Heuer alone wants legal advice before the faction decides how to handle any further ballots.

Background in the Landtag presidency vote

The plan follows the election of Tobias Rausch, a 35-year-old AfD member, as Landtag president in the week of 5 October 2026. Rausch received 48 votes in a secret ballot, although the AfD and the BSW, which had announced it would back him, together hold 44 seats. Hans-Thomas Tillschneider was elected as his deputy. When asked whether CDU members had also voted for him, Rausch said yes, and he added that it had been agreed that Siegmund could count on four CDU votes in December. Only five abstentions were recorded, although 14 of the 15 CDU members were present, and eight CDU members told the taz newspaper in its survey that they had abstained. Chancellor Friedrich Merz and other CDU members afterwards speculated about a false-flag operation by the SPD, Greens and Left.

What the walkout means for the vote

Under the state's electoral rules, Siegmund needs 42 of the 83 seats in the first two ballots, an absolute majority of the whole chamber. The AfD holds 39 seats after winning 43.8% of the vote in September, so it is three seats short. If no CDU member takes part in the first ballot, possible CDU defectors cannot vote for Siegmund, though the CDU will also be unable to show how its members voted. Focus notes that Siegmund's pledge to stand only in the first round is no guarantee. A third ballot follows different rules, in which a simple majority of votes cast is enough and abstentions do not count as votes cast.

I assume I will be elected in the first round. I will not stand for the election of prime minister without certainty.

Reactions and internal divisions

Sepp Müller, a CDU member of the Bundestag, backed the walkout. He also plans to seek the chairmanship of the state CDU at the party congress in early December.

Whoever does not hand in a ballot cannot be accused of anything later.

The AfD ridiculed the move as childish, and the BSW called it frighteningly unparliamentary. Political scientist Marcel Lewandowsky reads the plan mainly as an attempt by Schulze to discipline his faction.

This puts him in a position to avert, at least for now, a debate about a possible split in the party.

Berlin coalition talks stall

In Berlin, where the Left won the election, Elif Eralp wants to form a coalition with the SPD and Greens. She would be the city's first mayor with a migrant background and the first Left politician to hold the post. Those talks are now on hold, because the Left insisted on admitting into its faction a woman who had openly appeared with self-declared antisemites and allies of Hamas-linked organisations, which the SPD and Greens rejected.