The two remaining incumbent parties of the ruling coalition government are the center-left and the environmentalist .
They are putting forward current Chancellor and Vice-Chancellor as their respective chancellor candidates.
The two parties have remained pretty steady in the polls, behind their conservative and far-right opponents, however, they will be hoping for last-minute momentum similar to that giving the SPD their win in 2021.
At the head of the polls is the alongside its sister party the which only stands in Bavaria. Their chancellor candidate is the favorite to lead Germany, but he will likely need coalition partners as the CDU/CSU block is currently projected to win only around 30% of the vote.
The far-right is polling in second place, having seen its support surge from the around 10% that it won in 2021 to around 20% in recent polling. Its chancellor candidate is , but her chances seem slim as all other parties in the Bundestag have said they would refuse to work with the AfD.
The has seen the opposite, with its support going from over 11% in 2021 to less than 5% in recent polls. This means that the neoliberal party, which previously ruled with the SPD and Greens in a coalition before it withdrew, is facing the possibility of not reaching the threshold that blocks smaller parties. Although the party has not named an official chancellor candidate, the candidate at the top of the party list is .
The two remaining parties that could help form the Bundestag in February are the socialist Left Party and the . The BSW split from the in January 2024. While they both are nominally left-wing parties, the BSW has taken on a number of traditionally right-wing positions such as its stance against immigration. The BSW has particularly high support in the East and is seen as potentially taking votes not just from the Left but also from the AfD.
Both parties are hovering around the 5% threshold mark. While not an official chancellor candidate, is leading the Left as one of the party’s co-leaders.
Despite its low polling numbers, BSW has put forward, unsurprisingly, as its chancellor candidate.
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