Usually, the announcement of the final results of the federal election is a routine appointment. Not this time. There is clear criticism of the election organization in Berlin from the Federal Returning Officer.
Just three weeks after the general election, Federal Returning Officer Georg Thiel announced the final result on Friday. There were hardly any changes compared to the preliminary results from election night.
Because of the mishaps in Berlin, by-elections in the capital are not ruled out. Thiel is considering objecting to the validity of the election in individual constituencies in Berlin, as he announced on Friday. He will examine this “in more detail” in the coming days. He clearly criticized the organizers.
“The German electoral system imagines a different quality than it appeared here in Berlin on September 26.” Most of the incidents were due to organizational deficiencies, all of which could have been avoided. Closed polling stations due to missing ballot papers during the election period, waiting times of two or even three hours for voters are “not acceptable and certainly not for a federal capital and for a German electoral system,” said Thiel.
In Berlin, on September 26th, the citizens voted not only for the Bundestag, but also for the House of Representatives and district councils. In addition, there was the vote on a referendum on the expropriation of large housing companies. At the same time, the Berlin Marathon took place with many road closures. Long queues formed in front of polling stations, and some had to close temporarily due to missing ballot papers. With the replenishment it worked badly because of the road closures around the marathon. In addition, false ballot papers were displayed in some bars. Thiel cited corresponding incidents from a report that the Berlin state election control had sent him. He also criticized the fact that in some places too few voting booths were set up.
The problems in Berlin and possible consequences came up on Friday at the presentation of the final federal election results by the federal election committee. Compared to the preliminary result from election night, there were no changes in the second vote result: The SPD got 25.7 percent (2017: 20.5), the Union 24.1 (32.9), the Greens 14.8 ( 8.9), the AfD to 10.3 (12.6) and the Left to 4.9 percent (9.2). The turnout was 76.6 percent (2017: 76.2 percent).
CDU with a Bundestag mandate more
However, compared to the preliminary result, the CDU wins a mandate via its state list in North Rhine-Westphalia. The Union now has 197 seats. That is due to a second vote increase of 4491 votes, said Thiel. The rest of the distribution remains the same: 206 seats for the SPD, 118 for the Greens, 92 for the FDP, 83 for the AfD, 39 for the Left and 1 seat for the South Schleswig voter association (SSW), as a party of a national minority the five percent hurdle does not apply. The Bundestag is growing by 27 to 736 members compared to today.
There was a record for postal votes: of the almost 47 million people who cast their votes, a good 22 million used this route. The proportion of postal voters increased significantly from 28.6 to 47.3 percent compared to the last election in 2017. In Bavaria there were 62.4 percent – that was the highest percentage. In neighboring Thuringia, the percentage of postal votes was the lowest at 32.4 percent.
At the end of the day, the Bundestag itself decides whether or not there will be a new election in certain electoral districts because of the mishaps in Berlin. In principle, the Federal Returning Officer, the Land Returning Officer and all those eligible to vote in the Land can object to a Bundestag election up to two months after the election at the latest . The contact person is the Bundestag election review committee. He checks whether mistakes have occurred that could have affected the composition of the Bundestag or whether the rights of voters or candidates have been violated. The committee prepares a decision and submits it to the Bundestag plenary for a vote.
How and whether the composition of the Bundestag would change in the event of a by-election is unclear. The Federal Returning Officer could not make forecasts of the extent to which changes to the distribution of seats in the German Bundestag could result in the event of a re-election in constituencies in Berlin, his office said on Friday when asked. It is also not yet clear which constituencies would specifically be involved in the event of a possible objection. No final statement can be made on this yet. The Federal Returning Officer is waiting for more information on the election breakdowns in Berlin.
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