After the elections, Thuringia faces impossibility

Mike Mohring sticks with it: An alliance or even only talks with the left would not be in question, decrees Thuringia's top CDU candidate. "This party wants another Thuringia and another Germany," he told SPIEGEL. Its purpose is the gradual transformation of the country into a socialist society: "It is very important not to lose sight of who is behind Bodo Ramelow and who is coming after him."

Bodo Ramelow, this is the first left-prime minister in Germany, for five years, the man who came from the west almost 30 years ago, with a red-red-green alliance.

After the state election on 27 October, the already scarce majority for Ramelow could be lost. For CDU challenger Mohring but also no government majority - at least not one he strives for.

The closer election day moves, the more Mohring has to resist questions about possible cooperation with the left. The pressure on the 47-year-old is growing.

• Former Federal President Joachim Gauck recently spoke indirectly for an opening to the left. Left Prime Minister Ramelow came from the trade union tradition and has shown that he is not a pity with a leftist profile of society, said Gauck n-tv. "In other words, we may also have to look again and re-examine our previous demarcations - also party political."
• Already in the early summer of the Schleswig-Holstein CDU Prime Minister Daniel Günther had stated in a Spiegel double interview with the Thuringian Ramelow: "The time of exclusion is over." Even if Günther explicitly did not want to have understood this as a coalition offer to the left - exactly as it was understood in the Thuringian CDU.

Is not enough for red-red-green, it is enough for no other government

The statements are not by chance. All surveys in Thuringia show: As with the two East German state elections in September, there is a polarization between the AfD and the party, which provides the prime minister.

DPA / Martin rubble

Prime Minister Ramelow: Does he stay as head of a minority government?

While the CDU under Michael Kretschmer and in Brandenburg the SPD under Dietmar Woidke profited from this dynamic in Saxony, now moves in Thuringia, the left under Ramelow and stands in polls at just under 30 percent. The game is called: The Prime Minister wins. No matter if in Saxony or Brandenburg. And now also in Thuringia?

It does not seem to matter that the Left literally crashed in the elections in the other two Eastern countries. In Thuringia, the party of the Prime Minister apparently many voters as a guarantor for a stable government without AfD participation.

That's not right, mathematically speaking. Because the CDU and Mohring have not excluded coalitions not only with the left, but also with the AfD, who competes with Right Wing Björn Höcke. So with the two parties, which now come in the polls together to over 50 percent. If this were actually to happen, it automatically prevented any majority of the remaining parties.

ALEXANDER MUG / EPA-EFE / REX

AfD leading candidate Höcke: Thuringia's CDU has excluded cooperation with right-wing populists

It is still just under three weeks to the election. About one third of voters are undecided. Much also depends on whether the Liberals back into the state parliament. This results in three scenarios:

• The FDP does not make it into the state parliament. The Left, the SPD and the Greens reach 46 to 47 percent, which they have so far achieved in the polls to just barely continue the previous government. As early as 2014, the red-red-green voting majority had come about.
• The FDP returns to the Erfurt Parliament. This would require just under 50 percent of the votes for a seat majority. For red-red-green then it would probably not be enough, the only alternative would be a so-called Zimbabwe coalition (country colors green, yellow, red, black) from CDU, SPD, Greens and FDP.
• It is enough, regardless of the FDP, neither for red-red-green nor for a three- or four-party coalition under the leadership of the CDU. Then, as a way out of a minority government or new elections, there would be only one of the alliances that the CDU has so far stubbornly excluded: cooperation with the Left or AfD .

Mohring does not even want to talk about minority government

At least at this point wins the statement by Gauck meaning. Or that of Kurt Biedenkopf: "He seems to me reasonable, which has amazed me," the longtime Saxon CDU Prime Minister told SPIEGEL about Ramelow. In general, the left today is a different party than ten years ago, "it has changed."

Equally noteworthy is the recommendation of the former CSU leader Theo Waigel, who advised Mohring in a SPIEGEL interview: "Under no circumstances enter into a coalition with the AfD, then tolerate a minority government for a while."

But Mohring does not even want to talk about a minority government. "We do not aim for majority rule and do not talk about minority constellations," he told SPIEGEL.

In contrast, Ramelow muses again and again publicly about this option. Among other things, this may be due to the fact that the Prime Minister is in a comparatively comfortable situation at this point: as long as no successor is elected by the Landtag, the left will remain in office.

The state constitution sets no time limit for the formation of a new government.