The last state election for this year is over and it has made the left the strongest party in a country parliament for the first time in history. Significantly, the party has thereby benefited from the non-voters who could mobilize them. She wants to talk about forming a government now with "all democratic parties" - that is, everyone but the AfD.
Voter turnout was the highest in 25 years. Around 65 percent of eligible voters cast their votes - more than twelve percentage points more than five years ago.
The CDU has lost in the election clearly to voter confidence. The result of the party of country chief and top candidate Mike Mohring broke compared to the election in 2014 by just under twelve points and is now only at 21.8 percent. As in the elections in Saxony and Brandenburg, the CDU lost many voters to the AfD.
CDU loses voters to Left Party
The special feature in Thuringia: The CDU also gave out numerous voters to the Left Party of Prime Minister Bodo Ramelow. This is explained by the official bonus: Ramelow is popular over almost all camps. Even 60 percent of CDU voters agree with the statement that Ramelow is "a good prime minister." And so more than 20,000 former Union voters chose the Left this time.
This emerges from the analysis of the voter migration of Infratest dimap. The Electoral Research Institute calculates them on the basis of own surveys, the preliminary final result and other official statistics. Values are a rough estimate of how many voters could hold a party compared to the previous election, and how many voted to or from other parties.
Source: Infratest dimap / ARD (estimate based on pre- and post-election surveys, electoral and demographic statistics)
The left comes after preliminary result on 31 per cent of the votes. In addition to former CDU voters, it benefited from former SPD voters - and above all from the increased voter turnout: around 60,000 former non-voters this time voted for the left.
AfD convinces voters from all camps
The largest jump made the AfD: The party of Björn Höcke could more than doubled its share of votes and was with 23.4 percent second strongest force. She was able to convince voters from all other camps. In particular, former CDU voters, but also left-voters gave the AFD the vote this time. Above all, however, the party managed to mobilize non-voters like no other: around 80,000 of them voted this time for the AFD.
The SPD of the former state minister of economics Wolfgang Tiefensee lost in comparison to five years ago about four points and now comes only to 8.2 percent. The Social Democrats gave former voters to the left, among others. The slight gains from the camp of former non-voters could not offset the losses.
For young voters AfD is ahead
In this election, the AfD was able to score especially in young voters : 23 percent of voters under 25 voted for the party. Thus, the AfD scored even better in this electorate group than the Left, which took 22 percent here. The AfD was also ahead in the two other constituencies under the age of 44.
Only in the voters between 45 and 59 could overtake the left: It came to 28 percent, the AfD on 26. Clearly ahead was the left against the voters over 60 . With 38 percent, she claimed there against the AfD (21), the CDU (22) and the SPD (11).
For AfD voters, men are clearly in the majority
As in the state elections in Saxony and Brandenburg, but also in the 2017 general election in Thuringia especially men voted for the AfD: 28 percent of men voted right-wing populists and only 18 percent of women. The relationship is different for the CDU and the Left: Here, a few more women voted for the parties.
Large gap in educational attainment among voters of AfD and Greens
The AfD scored particularly in voters with low formal education points: They got there 27 percent. For voters with a high level of education, the party came only 16 percent, which was behind the CDU. Leftists and, above all, Greens were elected more frequently in the educational layer than by the less educated.
If one looks at the voters' assessment of their own economic situation , the AfD was able to score points above all among the dissatisfied (35 percent). The Left got here 26 percent, won for the "satisfied".
According to Infratest dimap , the AfD was mainly chosen by workers (39 percent). Only 24 percent of the workers voted for the left, which scored against retirees and employees.