Berlin: re-election valid – constitutional complaint inadmissible

The complaint to the Federal Constitutional Court against the repetition of the Berlin House of Representatives election was not admissible. This was announced by the court in a justification for its January decision published on Wednesday. The urgent application was unsuccessful because the constitutional complaint was inadmissible. The Basic Law guarantees the federal and state governments independent constitutional areas, which also include the right to vote.

Against this background, there is usually no room for a constitutional complaint in Karlsruhe against state constitutional court election scrutiny decisions, the court explained. A decision on the main issue of the constitutional complaint has not yet been made.

The Federal Constitutional Court had approved the repeat election in Berlin

The Federal Constitutional Court thus delivered the still outstanding reason why it had rejected an urgent application against the repeat election to the Berlin House of Representatives. With their decision in January, the Karlsruhe judges made it possible for the election to be repeated in Berlin on February 12 as planned.

The more than 40 plaintiffs, including affected MPs, had appealed against a judgment by the Berlin Constitutional Court in November. He had checked the breakdown election of September 26, 2021 in detail as the primarily responsible authority – and declared it invalid. In view of the large number and severity of the electoral errors, that was the only possibility, it was said to be the reason. The complainants believe that the Berlin judges thereby arbitrarily disregarded the Karlsruhe principles of the election examination.