Strong CDU, trimmed Greens: What that means for the country

Strong CDU, trimmed Greens: What that means for the country dpa • 18 million • 3 minutes reading time Manuel Hagel and Winfried Kretschmann have to govern together for another year. It's not about celebrating, says CDU state leader Manuel Hagel, after his party clearly won the federal election. Now we have to get to work. The CDU in the southwest may well have popped corks that evening: According to the preliminary official final result, the Christian Democrats in Baden-Württemberg got 31.6 percent, significantly more than in the 2021 federal election - and more than twice as much as their larger coalition partner in the southwest: The Greens only came in fourth place with 13.6 percent after the CDU, AfD and SPD. The Green Party's regional leader Pascal Haggenmüller speaks of a "stable result" - but he also states: "We see that the federal and state levels are becoming very similar in terms of values." For Prime Minister Winfried Kretschmann's party, this is precisely a massive problem, because the next state election is just over a year away. Kretschmann effect So far, the Greens have always been able to rely on the so-called Kretschmann effect: In Baden-Württemberg they usually performed better than nationwide. In the European elections last early summer, the lead had already melted away significantly, with the Southwest Greens two percentage points ahead of the federal Greens. And now, in the federal election, the result in the state is not much better than at the federal level. Not exactly a tailwind with a view to the next state election in spring 2026, because then the cards will be reshuffled in the southwest: the Green patriarch Kretschmann is no longer running after three terms in office. The outgoing Federal Minister of Agriculture, Cem Özdemir, is running for the Greens to succeed him. Whether he can transfer part of the Kretschmann effect to himself will probably determine whether the Green Party can continue to hold on to the government headquarters. It will be difficult for the Greens Even if CDU leader Hagel has not yet commented on his candidacy for the state elections, he is almost certain to be Özdemir's biggest competitor. And the starting position is comfortable for him, and not just because of his victory in the federal election. The CDU has been well ahead of the Greens in the state election polls for many months; the last SWR survey put them at 33 percent. The Greens landed at 22 percent in the poll, making up four percentage points with the announcement of Özdemir's candidacy. After the formation of a new federal government, Özdemir will have plenty of time to make himself known in the southwest. Observers expect that the state election campaign will now gain momentum - more than a year before the date. "We are now moving towards the election campaign," predicts political scientist Michael Wehner, who teaches as a professor at the University of Freiburg and heads the branch of the State Center for Political Education there. After the formation of the government, Özdemir will focus entirely on Baden-Württemberg and CDU leader Manuel Hagel will also do everything he can to become known in the southwest, says Wehner. The work in the green-black state government is unlikely to make this duel any easier. Hot phase not before Christmas Despite the good omens, the CDU should not, in the expert's view, prepare for a victory in the state election. The most important thing for the CDU is how a CDU-led federal government will perform. "The decisive factor will be whether it is rated positively in its performance record in March 2026," says Wehner. "The hot phase of the election campaign will not begin before Christmas," says Wehner. State election campaigns are not particularly relevant for the population, which is why they only get their bearings quite late. However, some state politicians are already saying behind closed doors that the state election campaign is now beginning. This is also supported by the fact that, according to the top representatives, the Green-Black coalition has now completed almost all of the projects in the coalition agreement.