Germany’s new government has rapidly fallen from grace with the voters.
Two days before Chancellor Friedrich Merz celebrated 100 days in office, a new poll accentuated what many saw as the so far dismal performance of his Conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and his junior coalition partner, the Social Democratic Party (SPD).
In the survey conducted by pollster Forsa for TV company RTL, the government parties’ combined share of the vote dropped to a new low of only 37 per cent.
The CDU was down to 24 per cent – three percentage points lower than just a month ago – while the SPD remained “stable” at just 13 per cent of the vote.
The main opposition group, the right-wing Alternative for Germany party (AfD), topped the polls with 26 per cent of the vote, equalising its earlier record from April 2025.
Sonntagsfrage zur Bundestagswahl • Forsa für RTL/n-tv: AfD 26 % | CDU/CSU 24 % | SPD 13 % | GRÜNE 13 % | DIE LINKE 11 % | BSW 4 % | FDP 3 % | Sonstige 6 %
➤ Übersicht: https://t.co/Gzilw3J3L9
➤ Verlauf: https://t.co/FJLtuxG3lb pic.twitter.com/WitKfSFoKT— Wahlrecht.de (@Wahlrecht_de) August 12, 2025
The Greens party was neck and neck with the SDP at 13 per cent, while the hard-left Die Linke remained strong with 11 per cent of the vote. That was a surprising level for many, given the party is the legal successor of the former East German Communist unity party. It was responsible for the deaths of hundreds of people who tried to flee the eastern bloc.
The Liberal Free Democratic Party (FDP) came in at 3 per cent with no realistic chance at making it back above the 5-per-cent-threshold necessary for a return to the German parliament.
For the survey, Forsa researchers questioned more than 2,500 respondents via telephone during the second week of August. The poll is one of the most respected and well-established voter surveys in Germany. It has been conducted regulary since 2013.
The poll’s results marked a new blow to Merz after a recent survey showed he was even less popular with the German voters than his unloved predecessor Olaf Scholz was 100 days into the latter’s chancellorship.
Many commentators have said Merz was betraying key Conservative causes in the interest of keeping his left-wing coalition partner happy.
“My analysis is: The government just is not leftist enough yet,” journalist Julian Reichelt wrote ironically on X.
Just days ago, Merz blindsided many CDU voters and party members after a complete turnaround of Germany’s Israel policy by banning weapons exports to the Jewish State. Reportedly that was not co-ordinated with his own party colleagues, in an effort to placate the SDP.
Previously, Merz had come under fire for consenting to the SPD’s pick for the vice president of the German Federal Constitutional Court, a radical left-winger. Only after CDU MPs threatened mutiny did the government decided to cancel the vote and table the issue for a later day.
