Merz Calls State Election Losses a Disaster as CDU Falls in Berlin and the East
Chancellor Friedrich Merz described the results in Berlin and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania as a "disaster" in a televised speech minutes after polls closed.
He pledged to stay on as chancellor and fight for his economic recovery and pro-growth reform programme. He is 70. He spoke as his government faced defeats in both the east and the capital The Guardian.
In Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) took 4.9% of the vote. That removed the party from the regional parliament for the first time in postwar history. It was the party's worst result in a state election.
The far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) won the state with 38% of the vote. The Social Democrats (SPD) finished second with 35.5%. For the AfD, it was a third victory in a German state.
Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania is a largely rural state in the northeast, in formerly communist eastern Germany. It voted alongside Berlin Reuters.
In Berlin, Germany's capital, the CDU lost to the leftwing Linke party. The Linke calls for expropriation of corporate landlords to address Berlin's housing crisis, meaning state takeover of large rental blocks with compensation.
The Berlin election was held on 20 September 2026. Twenty-six parties were admitted to contest the Berlin House of Representatives Berlin.de. The State Electoral Office runs the official portal for Berlin results, while Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania's portal is run by the Landesamt für innere Verwaltung.
The two votes followed the Saxony-Anhalt election on 6 September 2026. There the CDU scored 17% to the AfD's nearly 44%.
At federal level the SPD is Merz's coalition partner in national government. Germany's other main parties keep a "firewall" of non-cooperation against the AfD, a joint pledge not to govern with it. Berenberg chief economist Holger Schmieding said Merz is "fighting for his political survival."
The broader context here is a CDU losing for different reasons in different places. In the northeast voters consolidated around the AfD and SPD, leaving the CDU below the threshold for representation. In Berlin the challenge came from the left over housing and urban distribution, not the far right. Land elections do not remove a chancellor, but they shape Bundesrat majorities, recruitment, and trust in reforms that the Länder must implement.
Looking at what this means for the coalition, the SPD's second place in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania strengthens it as the senior partner weakens. September tests Merz's authority at Land level. The firewall holds for now, forcing complex coalitions or minority governments where the AfD is first but excluded. In Berlin the CDU will almost certainly leave city hall after talks, giving the Linke executive power while its housing plan faces legal and financial scrutiny.
In my view, calling the night a disaster and tying his future to economic recovery narrows Merz's room for manoeuvre. He has made Land results a referendum on pro-growth reform. If investment, productivity and fiscal signals do not improve, CDU pressure will likely grow. If they do, he can argue state protest says little about the Bundestag. The next talks in Berlin and Schwerin will be read as an early sign of whether the firewall can deliver stable governments under this fragmentation.
