Germany Has to Decide What Kind of Country It Wants to Be
Friedrich Merz finally took the gloves off against the AfD. Fine. But why did it take this long, and what happens if Berlin keeps hearing politicians better than it hears the people?
Seat Affected: The Seat of Democratic Trust
Seat Status: Fractured
Location: Germany
Theme: Representation • Migration • Government Performance • Political Normalization
STORIES
Friedrich Merz finally took the gloves off against the AfD.
Good.
But my question is:
Why the hell did it take this long?
After the massive AfD result in Saxony-Anhalt, Merz stood in the Bundestag and called the party a “destructive force.” He attacked its relationship with Russia. He went after “remigration.” And he said pretty clearly that what parts of the AfD mean by it amounts to ethnic cleansing based on origin and skin color.
That is much harder language than Germans had been used to hearing from him.
And when you look at what people are now saying about Merz himself, maybe you understand why he suddenly sounds so direct.
His approval numbers are miserable.
Trust in his leadership is miserable.
People in and around his own political camp are openly asking whether he is even the right man to lead the CDU into another federal election.
Angela Merkel called the Saxony-Anhalt result shocking and said her heart bleeds as a CDU member.
So yes, Merz is fighting back.
But Germany needs to understand something:
The AfD did not become dangerous on Sunday.
It did not suddenly become dangerous because it got around 44 percent in Saxony-Anhalt.
The warning signs were already there.
What changed is something else:
Now so many people have voted AfD that nobody can keep pretending it is some small protest party sitting on the edge of German politics.
It is not.
And no, that does NOT mean every AfD voter is a Nazi.
I do not believe that.
People vote AfD for all kinds of reasons.
They are angry about prices.
They are worried about pensions.
They are worried about migration.
Jobs.
Housing.
Bureaucracy.
Energy prices.
Crime.
Taxes.
And whether the government in Berlin has any damn idea how ordinary people actually live.
Many people in the East also feel that for decades they have been talked about more than they have been listened to.
Those frustrations are real.
But this is exactly where Germany needs to be damn careful:
Just because a problem is real does not mean every proposed solution is legitimate.
And just because you are angry at the government does not make the AfD harmless.
Those are two completely different things.
EVIDENCE
Saxony-Anhalt was not just another good election for the AfD.
The party got roughly 44 percent.
The CDU was crushed.
And that matters because the AfD organization in Saxony-Anhalt has been classified by the state's domestic intelligence service as confirmed right-wing extremist.
There are also documented connections and personnel overlaps involving people around the party and extremist organizations and movements.
That belongs in the record too.
And Germany should finally stop looking only at the face in front of the camera.
Young.
Good looking.
Friendly.
Calm.
A nice smile.
TikTok-ready.
So what?
What does that person believe?
Who stands behind them?
Who works for them?
What do these people want to do with political power?
Which laws do they want to change?
Which institutions do they want to weaken?
And who ends up less protected if they succeed?
THAT is the damn question.
Germany, of all countries, should understand that the packaging can change while the mechanism underneath can still be dangerous.
Now here is where it gets interesting.
What do Germans actually want?
The numbers do NOT simply show a country saying:
“We want the AfD.”
After the Saxony-Anhalt election, the ARD DeutschlandTrend found that 64 percent of Germans were worried about the result.
Only 24 percent were pleased by it.
But at the same time, 76 percent said the result was a deserved warning to the federal government.
Let that sit for a second.
A huge majority is telling Berlin:
WE HAVE HAD ENOUGH.
But that same population is not automatically saying:
WE WANT EVERYTHING THE AfD STANDS FOR.
That difference matters.
Germany is saying two things at the same time:
We do not trust this government the way we used to.
And at the same time, we are deeply nervous about where the alternative could take us.
That is a country politically fighting with itself.
And I think this is exactly what Berlin still has not understood:
The AfD does not only have the ears of AfD voters.
It has the ears of many more people than the people who finally put the cross next to AfD.
There are people out there who think similarly about migration but would never vote AfD.
People who are just as fed up with the federal government but cannot stomach parts of the AfD.
People who are tired of bureaucracy, energy policy, rising costs, migration that feels uncontrolled, or a political language in which they no longer recognize themselves.
They feel some of the same things.
They may not say it loudly.
Maybe they only say it at home.
At the pub.
With friends.
Or they think it and do not want to be immediately shoved into some political corner for saying it.
And still they do not vote AfD.
Yet.
That little word should make Berlin damn nervous.
YET.
Some people do not vote AfD today because the party is too extreme for them.
Because they cannot stand certain people in it.
Because the Russia issue goes too far.
Because they want nothing to do with right-wing extremism.
Because they would be ashamed to put their cross there.
Or because they are simply not ready to cross that last political line.
But what happens if their frustration keeps growing?
What happens if they keep feeling nobody is listening?
What happens if the AfD keeps changing its packaging?
Younger.
Friendlier.
Calmer.
More professional.
Less obviously extreme.
More “bourgeois.”
Then that line can move very quickly.
Probably faster than many politicians in Berlin want to admit.
MERZ
Merz has a much bigger problem than just the AfD.
People do not trust him.
Even before this election, his approval numbers were at historic lows.
Afterward, confidence in his leadership fell even further.
So when Merz suddenly comes out swinging against the AfD, Germans have every right to ask:
Is this conviction?
Or panic?
Maybe it is both.
But the bigger question is not whether Friedrich Merz gave a strong speech.
The bigger question is:
Can his government repair enough of what is making people angry so they do not eventually end up with the very people Berlin has spent years presenting as the untouchable line?
Because simply saying:
“The AfD is dangerous.”
will not be enough.
People need to know:
Dangerous HOW?
Dangerous TO WHOM?
What exactly changes?
What happens to the economy?
What happens to Germany's relationship with Europe?
What happens to NATO and foreign policy?
What happens to German institutions?
What happens to migrants?
What happens to Germans with migration backgrounds?
What happens to press freedom, culture, schools, courts, public broadcasting, and administration when people who reject parts of this system suddenly control parts of this system?
THOSE are the questions.
And the other side matters just as much:
If the established parties say they are the safe democratic alternative, then they need to show what their alternative actually is.
Not just:
“Do not vote AfD.”
But:
What are YOU doing?
What works?
What changes?
When?
Who pays?
And when do normal people finally feel the difference?
THE AfD IS NOT HARMLESS
The AfD says officially that “remigration” means the lawful return of foreigners who do not have a legal right to stay.
The party also says German citizens are German regardless of whether they have a migration background.
Fine.
Put that in the file.
But then put the rest of the file next to it.
Because public statements by important people in the party have at times gone considerably further than the polished wording on official websites.
And within significant parts of the party there is a nationalist idea about who really belongs, what Germany should be, and what the German people should mean.
That is not a side issue.
Words matter.
Personnel matter.
Connections matter.
And what people say BEFORE they have power damn well matters.
Germany should not wait until somebody controls a ministry before asking what that person intended to do with it.
And this is where I also see the AfD's biggest weakness:
It has a lot of answers that fit into a campaign sentence.
But you do not run a country on campaign sentences.
Germany has more than 80 million people.
Pensions.
Hospitals.
Care.
Industry.
Exports.
EU obligations.
NATO.
Energy supply.
Schools.
Housing shortages.
Labor shortages.
Migration.
Taxes.
Municipalities.
Roads.
Rail.
Digitalization.
And an aging population.
“Remigration” is not an economic program.
“Close the borders” is not a pension reform.
“Brussels” is not an answer to German export dependence.
“Germany first” still does not explain how Germany is supposed to function the next morning.
That is why I say this:
The AfD has not yet shown a convincing, complete plan for how it would actually govern this country better.
But it has something else.
It is hearing something the established parties spent far too long refusing to hear.
Or at least it gives many people the feeling that it is listening.
And politically, that can become almost as powerful as a good governing plan.
MAYBE GERMANY ALSO HAS TO BREAK OUT OF ITS OWN POST-HITLER MENTALITY
And before somebody deliberately misunderstands what I mean:
No.
I am NOT saying Germany should forget its history.
Exactly the opposite.
Germany should understand its history.
But maybe Germany learned a political fear from Hitler and National Socialism that has itself become a cage.
A fear of saying certain things out loud.
A fear of leaving certain political lines.
A fear of handling certain subjects differently because somebody immediately says:
“We cannot do that because of our history.”
But at some point you have to ask:
What are people saying today?
What do the laws say today?
What works today?
What does NOT work?
And are government and politics actually responding to that?
Or are politicians mainly listening to other politicians?
Party headquarters.
Coalition partners.
Political commentators.
Established language rules.
The famous “firewall.”
But not enough to the people outside who work, pay taxes, raise children, expect pensions, and have to pay their bills at the end of the month?
When will Germany be brave enough to break out of these narrow political boxes?
Not to the right.
Not to the left.
But outward.
Into reality.
Maybe Germans need to understand that you do not honor history by becoming politically paralyzed by fear of it.
You honor history by understanding the mechanisms that were dangerous then AND having enough confidence to make democratic decisions now.
A democracy cannot be so afraid of a wrong opinion that it eventually stops answering uncomfortable questions.
Because those questions do not disappear.
They simply find somebody else willing to answer them.
And that is exactly what the AfD benefits from.
Maybe that is the greatest political irony of all:
The less openly some issues are discussed, the easier it becomes for the AfD to claim it is the only party even allowed to talk about them.
That is a gift.
And Berlin keeps handing it over.
WHO IS MISSING?
The people who do not fit neatly into either political camp.
The German worker who thinks migration policy needs to change but does not want ethnic nationalism.
The pensioner who is furious with Merz but does not want Germany closer to Putin.
The East German who has felt ignored by Berlin for decades but does not want a weaker democracy.
The business owner who complains about migration while desperately looking for workers.
And the German citizen named Özdemir, Yılmaz, Nguyen, Rossi, Kowalski, or Okafor who suddenly has to listen while politicians argue about who really belongs to the German people.
They have a seat too.
This is their Germany too.
And there is another reality:
Germany is aging.
Germany needs workers.
A large part of care, health care, hospitality, skilled trades, logistics, construction, and other industries already depends on people with migration backgrounds or foreign workers.
So when somebody shouts:
REMIGRATION!
I say:
Fine.
Show me the recipe.
Who exactly goes?
How many?
Under what law?
Who replaces their work?
Who pays into the pension system?
Who takes care of Grandma?
Who works in the hospital?
Who builds the housing?
Who fixes the heating?
Who fills the jobs Germany already cannot fill?
Do not just give me a slogan.
Give me the receipts.
And then give me the bill.
WHERE IS GERMANY GOING?
Nobody can answer that honestly yet.
But Germany is approaching a fork in the road.
The AfD does NOT have a national majority.
That matters.
Even with national support in the high 20s, most Germans are still voting for somebody else.
But a party does not need 51 percent to massively change a political system.
It only needs to become strong enough that everybody else starts building politics around it.
And that is already happening.
Look at the language.
Look at the migration debates.
Look at how political boundaries have moved.
Look at what politicians will say publicly today that would have been almost unthinkable ten years ago.
THAT is normalization.
Normalization does not automatically mean everybody suddenly votes AfD.
Sometimes it means the entire political conversation slowly moves in its direction.
And that can be just as consequential.
Germany now has several possible paths.
One is that democratic parties finally solve enough real problems that protest stops being the most attractive political offer.
Another is that established parties keep taking over AfD language while failing to solve the problems underneath it.
Then maybe the AfD does not become more moderate.
Maybe more and more of what once looked extreme simply becomes normal.
And then there is a third path:
People eventually decide they want to see what the AfD actually does with real executive power.
Then Germany will no longer be arguing about what the AfD MIGHT do.
Germany will see what it DOES.
And that is something completely different.
Anyone who thinks that could never happen should look very carefully at Saxony-Anhalt.
Because maybe the most dangerous sentence in politics is:
“People would never do that.”
Until they do.
ACTION
Stop insulting AfD voters as a group.
Start taking the policies apart.
If people are worried about migration, show them what works and what does not.
If they are worried about pensions, show them the math.
If they are worried about crime, show them the data.
If they are worried about housing, show them the housing plan.
If they are worried about jobs and wages, stop telling them the economy is not so bad when their own bank account tells them something different every month.
And then make the AfD do exactly the same thing.
No slogans.
Receipts.
You want remigration?
Who exactly goes?
You want closer relations with Russia?
What happens if Germany becomes dependent on Moscow again?
You want less EU?
What happens to German exports and companies built around the European market?
You want to tear down parts of the current political system?
Fine.
Which parts?
What replaces them?
Who gets more power?
Who loses protection?
And the other parties?
They need to answer the same questions.
You want to stop the AfD?
How?
Other than warnings?
What is your plan for migration?
Your plan for pensions?
Your plan for housing?
Your plan for energy?
Your plan for the East?
Your plan for making people feel represented again?
A firewall is not government policy.
A firewall does not build a house.
It does not raise a pension.
It does not repair a school.
It does not create a job.
It does not control a border.
It does not lower an electricity bill.
And it does not create trust.
If democratic parties want to stop more people from going to the AfD, they need to stop pretending political separation is the same thing as a political answer.
It is not.
TOGETHER
Germany's history does not mean Germany is destined to repeat it.
That would be nonsense.
But Germany's history DOES mean this country has no excuse for pretending it does not know how normalization works.
It does not always arrive in the same uniform.
It does not use the same words.
It does not wear the same hairstyle.
It does not march in the same formation.
Sometimes it wears a nice suit.
Sometimes it has TikTok.
Sometimes it smiles.
Sometimes it just says it wants “order.”
The packaging changes.
The question is what the politics does once it gets power.
But Germany needs to learn something else from its history too:
Do not freeze in front of the past.
Do not become so afraid of crossing political lines that you stop noticing when the population is already asking different questions.
The answer to Hitler is not political cowardice.
The answer is a strong, confident democracy that can listen, argue, disagree, and solve problems without throwing away its fundamental values.
Germany does not need to learn less from its history.
Germany needs to learn the right things from it.
So yes:
Merz finally took the gloves off.
Maybe he should have done it sooner.
But Germany's future will not be decided by whether Friedrich Merz can shout louder at the AfD in the Bundestag.
It will be decided by whether democratic governments can give people a reason to trust democracy again.
And whether voters understand the enormous difference between:
“This government is failing me.”
and:
“So I will give my vote to the people promising to tear the whole system apart.”
Those are NOT the same decision.
But let us not fool ourselves either:
There are probably many more people who share some of the AfD's concerns, questions, or positions than there are people who vote AfD today.
The question is not only how many AfD voters there are today.
The question is:
How many more people are already standing at that line?
And how long will they stay on the other side?
Germany has to figure out what decision it is actually making.
And after Saxony-Anhalt, we should stop pretending the country has unlimited time to figure it out.
Receipts & Recipes
Receipt: Check the official Saxony-Anhalt election result, the ARD DeutschlandTrend, Merz's Bundestag remarks, the state intelligence classification of the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt, the AfD's own remigration language, and public statements by significant party figures.
Recipe: Do not ask only whether a party sounds angry enough to match your frustration. Ask whether its policies work as a complete governing plan. Then demand the same level of detail from the parties already in power.
Sources & Receipts
- ZDFheute — Merz, AfD and the Bundestag general debate
- State of Saxony-Anhalt — Preliminary official state election result
- Tagesschau / ARD DeutschlandTrend — Reactions to the Saxony-Anhalt election
- WDR — September 2026 DeutschlandTrend political mood
- ZDFheute — AfD personnel and extremist-network reporting in Saxony-Anhalt
- Federal Agency for Civic Education — Analysis of AfD program and ideology
- AfD — The party's own explanation of “remigration”
Verification Notice
The Missing Seat distinguishes between documented facts, political analysis, and opinion. This editorial does not claim every AfD voter is extremist, nor does it treat legitimate public concerns about migration, pensions, crime, housing, economic security, or government performance as extremist. It argues that those concerns should be answered with evidence and workable policy while the AfD's personnel, public statements, program, institutional goals, and governing capacity are examined just as rigorously. The phrase “post-Hitler mentality” is used here as political commentary about Germany's postwar political caution, not as a claim that today's Germans think like Hitler or support National Socialism.
Stories are evidence.
Evidence drives change.
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