Loren Balhorn

Well, what I meant by that was in the regional elections earlier this spring, large groups (by no means a majority, but 10-25 percent) of trade unionists and workers more generally voted for the AfD, citing general political dissatisfaction and migration as their main reasons for doing so. It’s worth noting that the party has performed significantly worse in elections since then. While Die Linke’s returns vary from state to state and some areas show more promise than others, in general the party appears to be losing ground among sections of the working class and dissatisfied protest voters more generally, particularly in less urban and economically marginalized regions. The process is not a foregone conclusion, and to what extent the AfD can duplicate the success of its European counterparts remains to be seen (Germany is still not, or at least not yet, France or Hungary), but I think it’s fair to say that the honeymoon years of 2005–2010 when Die Linke was the paramount opposition in parliament and able to attract the politically disenfranchised by default has ended.