“Thuringia’s parliament elects CDU’s Thadäus König as speaker, defying tradition and sidelining the far-right AfD party.”
BERLIN — On Saturday, lawmakers in the eastern part of Germany called Thuringia picked Thadäus König from the center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) as their state parliament speaker, breaking the usual rule that the speaker is usually from the biggest party after a local election.
This move happened right after the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) won its first local election, getting almost one-third of the votes.
The vote went on for two days because a court said the AfD’s leader who was in charge of the meeting was not doing a good job.
This election is going to be a rough ride for Thuringia’s parliament after the September 1 election, where the AfD was the top choice but didn’t get enough votes to be in charge. No other political group wants to team up with the AfD.
On Thursday, the Thuringia legislature was set to pick a new speaker. Like in other German states, the oldest lawmaker usually starts leading the first meeting after an election, which was Jürgen Treutler from the AfD.
Treutler got a lot of flak for not letting other lawmakers speak or for not letting candidates from other parties run for speaker.
Mit einer deutlichen Mehrheit konnte sich der CDU-Politiker Thaddäus König am Samstag gegen die AfD-Kandidatin Wiebke Muhsal durchsetzen. Die Wahl erfolgte erst nach einer Entscheidung des Verfassungsgerichtshofs. https://t.co/Te0fkfIuza
— Frankfurter Allgemeine (@faznet) September 28, 2024
So, the CDU complained to Thuringia’s constitutional court, which said rules could be changed before picking a speaker.
On Saturday, in a more calm setting, König was chosen speaker with 54 votes, while Wiebke Muhsal from the AfD got 32, with one lawmaker not voting. The AfD has 32 seats in the parliament.
Usually, the biggest party gets to pick the speaker, but other parties didn’t want to back the AfD and didn’t like Muhsal because of a past fraud charge.
What’s next for the state government is unclear since no party wants to work with the AfD.
Germany’s secret service has put the AfD’s Thuringia branch under watch, calling it a “known right-wing extremist” group.
So, the only way forward might be a weird mix of the CDU, a new party from the left, and the center-left Social Democrats.
This group would only have one more seat than they need and might have to get help from the Left Party, which comes from communist ideas.