Constituent session: Showdown in Thuringia – Who will become President of the State Parliament?

The Thuringian state parliament is meeting today for its first session, almost four weeks after the election – and is giving a foretaste of how complicated and explosive the political situation is in the small Free State.

In Erfurt, it is actually only about the constitutive session of parliament, which always includes the election of a state parliament president. However, what is on the agenda is a first showdown between the AfD, which for the first time has the strongest faction in a German state parliament, and the CDU, BSW, Left and SPD on the other side.

Even before the session has begun, there is talk of possible tricks, uncertain cantonists and a trip to the Constitutional Court. “It will certainly be an exciting day,” predicts the parliamentary manager of the AfD faction, Torben Braga.

Why this nervousness?

In Thuringia, many still remember the 2020 state premier election, when the AfD put forward a dummy candidate whom it did not elect, but instead helped to hoist FDP politician Thomas Kemmerich into office. Now it’s about the office of state president. As the strongest force, the AfD, with 32 of 88 MPs, has the right to propose candidates for the second highest state office. However, the other four factions do not want to elect a candidate to the top of parliament from a party that is classified as definitely right-wing extremist by the state’s Office for the Protection of the Constitution and is under observation.

So that other factions can also put forward candidates for election right from the start, the CDU and BSW want to change the rules of procedure at the last minute and include a passage from the Thuringian constitution. According to this, candidates should come from the middle of parliament – all factions would then have the right to propose candidates. The SPD and the Left also support this. The AfD considers the planned procedure to be illegal. “This is an exclusive opinion of the AfD,” says CDU faction leader Mario Voigt.

Who are the factions putting forward?

The AfD parliamentary group has nominated its MP Wiebke Muhsal as a candidate. The 38-year-old was sentenced to a fine for fraud years ago. Courts found it proven that she had brought forward an employment contract with an employee by two months in 2014 in order to receive additional money from the state parliament administration. Thuringia’s BSW parliamentary group leader Katja Wolf called the proposal a “provocation”.

The CDU is sending Thadäus König into the election as a consensus candidate. The 42-year-old had the best first-vote result nationwide in the state election. Representatives of BSW, SPD and the Left Party signaled that they see König as a good candidate for the state parliament leadership.

Which scenarios are being discussed?

The meeting is chaired by the oldest member, 73-year-old Jürgen Treutler from the AfD. According to the agenda, he opens the meeting, calls out the names of the members of parliament and determines whether the state parliament has a quorum. It is also customary to ask whether there are any objections to the agenda. Treutler recently indicated that he expects objections – and also interruptions.

The parliamentary manager of the CDU parliamentary group, Andreas Bühl, said he could imagine that Treutler would skip or cancel the agenda item on changing the rules of procedure on his own initiative. “Then we would object,” said Bühl. Such an approach would clearly exceed the authority of the oldest member of parliament, said Bühl.

Why do we keep talking about the Constitutional Court?

CDU parliamentary group leader Voigt wants to appeal to the Constitutional Court in Weimar if the rules of the state parliament or the constitution are violated. The parliamentary manager of the AfD also announced that he would go to the Constitutional Court if the state parliament did not comply with the existing rules of procedure.

If the constitutional judges have to decide, the state parliament session would be interrupted. The Federal Constitutional Court recently made it clear in a lawsuit filed by the AfD parliamentary group that “a right to propose is not linked to a specific election result.”

The Jena political scientist Torsten Oppelland describes it like this: The AfD has the right to propose candidates, but no right to a specific office – “for that it has to get a majority”. In his view, however, it would have been more elegant to change the state parliament’s rules of procedure months ago.

Are there any other imponderables?

Treutler, the oldest member of parliament, could also simply leave the plenary hall and thereby interrupt the session. Then it would possibly be the turn of the second oldest member of parliament – the parliamentary managers said that this would also be an AfD member of parliament. But there are many other imponderables – for example, if Treutler does not call out the names of the members of parliament at all and no quorum is established. Then there would be a list of signatures that could prove that there is a quorum, it was said.

Is a surprise possible?

Perhaps the state parliament session will end without a long interruption and with an election. The AfD insists on its right to propose candidates for the presidential election, but Braga has not ruled out a compromise offer. He is pragmatic enough that an AfD presidential candidate will not find a majority in the Thuringian parliament. However, he is optimistic “that a solution will be found.” “There are ways to reach compromises.” Braga left open what these might look like before the decisive state parliament session.