The hard-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) has become the most popular party in the country, according to the results of a new poll.
The anti-immigration AfD, led by Alice Weidel, now has 26 per cent support, while approval rates for the German Chancellor, Friedrich Merz, have plummeted 100 days since his election.
As popularity for Weidel’s party surged, the poll found that 67 per cent of the country were dissatisfied with Merz’s performance, particularly among AfD supporters.
Only 29 per cent of respondents were satisfied with his work – marking the lowest point in the Chancellor’s popularity since he was elected in May.
Meanwhile, support for Merz’s mainstream conservative bloc – the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU) and Christian Social Union in Bavaria (CSU) alliance – fell to 24 per cent, according to the poll carried out by the Forsa Institute for Social Research and Statistical Analysis.
Only a small majority of the population – 53 per cent – believe the current coalition will sustain itself until the next federal election in 2029, with some 42 per cent of Germans expecting its early end.
The hard-right AfD party, that was formally designated as extremist by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) in May, is the largest opposition party in Germany’s Bundestag.
During federal elections in February, the party won a record 152 seats in the 30-seat parliament, nagging almost 21 percent of the vote.
Right-wing populist parties have performed successfully in elections across Europe in recent years, from Poland to Romania, and Portugal to the Netherlands.
In June, Poland elected conservative eurosceptic Karol Nawrocki as its new president after a staggering turnaround to clinch 50.89 per cent of the vote.
Supported by the Law and Justice party (PiS), Nawrocki campaigned on a promise to ensure economic and social policies favouring Poles over other nationalities, including refugees from neighbouring Ukraine.
By May, the BfD had already designated several chapters of the AfD – such as its youth wing and some state-level branches – as extremist.
But the spy agency said it decided to give the entire party the label due to its attempts to ‘undermine the free, democratic’ order in Germany, citing the ‘xenophobic, anti-minority, Islamophobic and anti-Muslim statements made by leading party officials’.
The AfD criticised the decision as a ‘heavy blow’ to democracy and vowed to mount a legal challenge
Weidel, a former economist with over 970,000 followers on TikTok, has called for tightening Germany’s borders and deporting migrants who came illegally and committed crimes.
