00:00Well, a huge day and moment, not just in terms of German politics, but European politics when
00:06it comes to this Saxony-Arnthol election in Germany. A test of whether the AFD could match
00:14their poll ratings, a test as to how far the Conservatives in power, led by Friedrich Merz
00:22and the Social Democrats that they're in coalition with, how far their support has fallen or whether
00:27they could recover for some pretty shocking poll results. And Germany overall, a country
00:33really witnessing mass de-industrialisation at a pretty alarming rate and unemployment,
00:41not in a good place in terms of the level there you can see in Germany in recent times.
00:48And Friedrich Merz leading the Conservatives, just a complete different message to what Angela
00:54Merkel was given when she was in charge of Germany in terms of border policy, in terms
01:00of asylum, in terms of migration policy. You can see here very clearly the Conservatives
01:07looking to try and stop the rise of the AFD, taking a tougher stance, whether the German people
01:14buy that or not, whether it's enough to win back support to the Conservatives, we'll have
01:17to wait and see. What we do know is that Merz is the German Chancellor, incredibly unpopular.
01:25And we also know that in that Saxony-Arnholt vote today, you did see at midday turnout up more
01:33than 12 points compared to 2021. There was a final sort of warning from Merz to voters in
01:41Saxony-Arnholt, that international investors might not like an AFD victory. But a huge moment,
01:50a huge vote, a huge election, and as expected, a pretty dramatic result.
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03:06now having come out for this election, a very dramatic result indeed has been confirmed. Just
03:13before I get to those though, just to give the overall insight into voters in Saxony-Arnhalt,
03:19you saw the AFD finish first on 35% when it came to the question on who can solve the
03:25most important
03:25issues. And you see the Conservatives came second. When it came to a direct head-to-head
03:31of preferred leader, you can see there the AFD on 38% versus 46% for the Conservative. But two
03:43exit
03:44polls have come out, both confirming a very dramatic result indeed. You see this first one that has just
03:51come out that has the AFD winning there by a country mile on 44.5% of the vote with
03:59the Conservatives
04:00in second, but on less than 20%. And the left party come in third there with the Greens fourth. And
04:08what's crucial about that is that means the Social Democrats are in government nationally with the
04:14Conservatives are actually fifth in that exit poll. Another exit poll actually having the Social
04:20Democrats join third there with the left party. But you can see what the trend is in both of these
04:28exit polls. Massive votes there, if these are accurate, of over 44% of the vote there for the AFD
04:36with the Conservatives on less than 20%. So very, very dramatic indeed. I will of course keep bringing
04:43you more on this as it develops in the days ahead, but please do whack this video a quick thumbs
04:49up,
04:50and of course, as ever, cheers for watching.
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