Weil's victory helps the ailing chancellor out of the greatest distress

He's done it again. For the third time in a row, Stephan Weil (SPD), who became head of government in Lower Saxony in 2013 as a "normal beer-drinking lawyer", emerged as future prime minister from a state election. With this success, which is not surprising in view of the pre-election polls but is remarkable because of the negative national trend of his party, he also strengthens the chancellor's back.

A defeat for the SPD in Lower Saxony would have been another major setback for Olaf Scholz after poor performances in North Rhine-Westphalia and Schleswig-Holstein.

But the Social Democrats in Hanover, but also in Berlin, were in the best of spirits on this last election Sunday of 2022. Kevin Kühnert felt “tailwind” for the traffic lights just a few seconds after the polling stations closed. "This is a clear election victory for Stephan Weil and his Lower Saxony SPD, which got a really great result from its own strength," said the SPD general secretary.

Weil's victory, added SPD national chairman Lars Klingbeil, "feels very good, especially in these turbulent times". And the election winner himself was in a good mood: "We have shown," says Weil on ZDF, "that the SPD can be successful even under difficult circumstances."

In the state elections in Lower Saxony, Prime Minister Stephan Weil's SPD became the strongest force. The Greens are heading for a record result. Robin Alexander says about the election result: “The traffic light can propagate in the countries. But without the FDP.”

Source: WORLD

Previously, the figures from the election day forecasts had essentially confirmed the predictions of the pollsters. You had not seen the Lower Saxony SPD quite up to the good result of 2017 (36.9 percent), but still clearly ahead of the rival Christian Democrats and thus in first place in this state election.

A lead, that is also clear to every comrade on this election night, which the SPD owes above all to Stephan Weil. All surveys confirm that the 63-year-old former mayor of the state capital Hanover is by far the most popular politician in his state.

An office bonus that has largely offset the Berlin traffic light malus that accompanied the SPD, Greens and FDP through the Lower Saxony election campaign. Weil's CDU challenger, the incumbent Economics Minister Bernd Althusmann, couldn't even begin to keep up in terms of popularity. On the evening of the election, he announced that he would be stepping down as state chairman of the Union in Lower Saxony.

Kevin Kühnert, the SPD general secretary, emphasized a second point that characterized Weil's election campaign. Under the pressure of this difficult election campaign, Lower Saxony's head of government not only acted "self-confidently for his state", but also "responsibly for the big picture". In fact, in recent weeks, Weil had defied the obvious temptation to make a name for himself against the unpopular traffic light coalition in the federal government. On the contrary.

Right up to the last week's inconclusive prime ministers' conference, he remained loyal to the chancellor and undauntedly praised his policies. The Lower Saxony expressed criticism at best in homeopathic doses. He warned early on that pensioners should be included in the distribution of the energy money and recently called for more speed in the design of the gas price brake, although this was in vain.

All in all, there is no question that Weil's foreseeable re-election as head of government in Hanover is at least a small confirmation of the Chancellor's current leadership. Until the next state election, the state election in Bremen on May 14, 2023, Scholz will have peace on the state political front. In view of the multitude of other challenges, this is at least a small relief for the Chancellor, who is beset by crises and a lack of consent from the citizens.

Stephan Weil, who announced two years ago that he did not want to continue the grand coalition in Hanover beyond autumn 2022, but wanted to strive for an alliance with the Greens, confirmed this plan on the evening of the election. If the numbers were there even after the provisional official final result was available, he would stick to his "preference for a red-green state government". On the evening of the election, not even the political opponent doubted that this will be negotiated in coalition negotiations between the SPD and the Greens in the coming weeks.

So in Hanover, a red-green cabinet led by Stephan Weil and his probable deputy, the Green top candidate Julia Willie Hamburg, will have to deal with the consequences of the Ukraine war and the severe economic crisis that will foreseeably develop from it.

Because of this, Weil already announced during the election campaign that he wanted to set up a supplementary budget as the first step after a possible re-election. According to this, Lower Saxony is to make one billion euros available in particular for cases of hardship that do not sufficiently benefit from the federal government's planned 200 billion package.

Because his third term of office, which he also announced long before this election Sunday, will be his last. In 2027, at the next Lower Saxony election, he does not want to run again, but rather retire as a normal, beer-drinking ex-government.

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