When the photo was taken last Thursday that gave the CDU the next discussion about the firewall, the discussion at the election forum of the Liberal Middle Class Saxony-Anhalt Association in a seminar hotel in Halberstadt had already been going on for a whole hour. Guido Heuer, the leader of the Union parliamentary group in the state parliament Magdeburgwho represented Prime Minister Sven Schulze at the panel discussion in front of a good 150 medium-sized entrepreneurs that evening, had just spent five minutes talking about the topic of “securing skilled workers and recruiting young talent” when he passed the microphone to the person sitting next to him on the podium.
“You might think that you have never had anything to do with the government when I listen to it,” says Ulrich Siegmund, the top candidate AfD in the state elections in Saxony-Anhalt, and puts his hand on his shoulder this year. Heuer shakes his head, leans forward and reaches for the microphone again. “I’ve never sat in the Bundestag,” the CDU man then says. This evening he is trying to use every opportunity to distance himself from federal politics. In the photo taken at this moment, Heuer and Siegmund look very familiar. There is no sign of a fire wall in the picture.
When, almost an hour after the photo moment with Siegmund, the moderators of the election forum asked him about an outlook for September 2026 and possible constellations after the state election, his answer was still clear. “I’ve been saying it for months: We’re not entering into a coalition with either the left or the right, period,” he says. Scattered applause, boos and growing unrest can be heard from the audience, whereupon Heuer explains his position in more detail.
Separate instead of exclude?
“I’ve never liked the fact that we need a firewall,” he says. The CDU parliamentary group in Saxony-Anhalt adheres to the motto of demarcating instead of excluding. “Because exclusion means firewall,” says Heuer. “You just ruled it out,” a businessman from the audience retorts, referring to the CDU collaborating with the AfD after the state elections. “But that’s not a firewall,” emphasizes Heuer. “Yeah, what’s that then?” it echoes back. “Oh, just stop,” shouts Heuer.
The fact that the middle class gathered here doesn’t have much interest in either separating themselves from the AfD or excluding the right-wing party becomes clear that evening when the party representatives arrive to the sound of disco music. There is polite applause for CDU man Heuer as well as the representatives of BSW, Greens, Left and SPD. When AfD man Siegmund is called, cheers erupt. “The clear support for Ulrich Siegmund didn’t surprise me,” says Matthias Neyer, general secretary of the Liberal Middle Class Association of Saxony-Anhalt. In his conversations with club members, the impression has recently become solidified that the AfD’s top candidate is addressing the concerns of small and medium-sized companies.
During the preparation of the electoral forum, the association had trouble with the federal executive board. “The Liberal Middle Class Federal Association distances itself from advertising for the AfD,” explained Angelika Hießerich-Peter, the federal chairwoman of the FDP’s frontline organization. There were also obvious differences with the regional association of the FDP in Saxony-Anhalt. The FDP’s top candidate for the state elections in Saxony-Anhalt, Infrastructure Minister Lydia Hüskens, was not invited to the election forum. As justification, the Liberale Mittelstand Sachsen-Anhalt eV refers to the most recent state election surveys, in which the FDP remained below the perception threshold.
Applause for cheap energy
“Mr. Siegmund is recognized as having an understanding of small and medium-sized companies and problem-solving skills,” says Neyer for the members of the Liberal Medium-Sized Enterprises Association in Saxony-Anhalt. Siegmund doesn’t have to prove it at the election forum in Halberstadt. However, many of the medium-sized companies gathered here can be found in his inventory of the economic policy problems. “We want freedom for companies, they know best what they need, so we as politicians should stay out of that,” says Siegmund in his opening statement.
The first topic that the moderators raise is the question of what should happen next for energy-intensive companies in Saxony-Anhalt. “With reasonable competitive conditions, and that includes cheap energy,” says Siegmund to great applause. It is the audience’s first clear reaction to a speech that evening. How energy costs should fall is stated in the AfD’s “government program”: among other things, it wants to lift the sanctions against Russian oil and gas, stop the phase-out of coal and the expansion of wind power and end subsidies for renewable energies.
The next round of applause goes to Claudia Wittig, the BSW’s top candidate for the state election. “Anyone who still gives the CDU special economic competence has obviously been living under a rock in recent years,” she says in her opening statement. The dissatisfaction with the Union derives primarily from federal politics, says Matthias Kappis, until a few months ago state chairman of the Association of Family Businesses in Saxony-Anhalt. “Above everything is the hope for change,” he says about the popularity of the AfD.
Middle class comes first
People noticed that the federal government promised a lot but delivered little, and that it was not succeeding in putting Germany on a growth path through reforms, says the entrepreneur. Kappis resigned from the chairmanship of the regional association of family entrepreneurs after the federal executive board put up the firewall against the AfD in December. The federal association had previously temporarily allowed AfD representatives to be invited to panel events and was sharply criticized for this. Kappis says that the hope of many medium-sized businesses is that under a state government with AfD participation they will receive more political attention and their needs will be taken seriously.
Small and medium-sized businesses play a prominent role in the AfD program for the state elections. “Promoting small and medium-sized businesses instead of subsidizing large globalist corporations!” is what it says at the top of the chapter on business and tourism. This is followed by the demand for an end to “economically damaging sanctions”, particularly on energy imports from Russia. The AfD wants to strengthen crafts through a voluntary craft year. For every new “useful bureaucratic measure” created, at least two “unnecessary regulations” should be deleted.
Siegmund does not want to solve the demographic challenges of the country with the highest average age in Germany through migration, but rather through improved conditions for local skilled workers who have emigrated from Germany in recent years. “They don’t want to live in a country where you can change your gender once a year, but where things are looking up, there is a founder’s mentality and a welcoming culture for top performers,” he says in Halberstadt.
Prime Minister as a firefighter
Prime Minister Schulze apologized this evening for his participation in the Prime Minister’s Conference of the East German federal states in Berlin. According to Heuer, this is also about the Schkopau power plant site, a good 100 kilometers from Halberstadt, whose future is at risk because of the “Southern bonus” for new gas power plants in the draft of the Federal Government’s Electricity Supply Security and Capacity Act.
Just a few weeks ago, in Harzgerode, 40 kilometers from Halberstadt, Schulze successfully campaigned to preserve almost 1,000 industrial jobs at the automotive supplier Bohai Trimet. In the Leuna chemical park, 120 kilometers away, which is of outstanding economic importance for the entire country, Schulze worked for months to save the insolvent Domo Chemicals. The state, under Economics Minister Sven Schulze, together with the district and the city, pulled out all the stops to establish a logistics center for the commercial vehicle manufacturer Daimler Truck in Halberstadt, from which the local trade would also benefit. Daimler Truck has just announced that it will create additional jobs at the location.
The commitment to the business location is also recognized in medium-sized companies. “At the moment the Prime Minister acts almost exclusively as a fireman. That is necessary and right,” says Gerhard Meffert, chairman of the Association of Liberal Medium-Sized Saxony-Anhalt. The feedback on the appearance of CDU parliamentary group leader Guido Heuer at the election forum was also “quite positive,” he says. The question of the competence of medium-sized businesses is overshadowed by the failed Intel settlement, says Meffert about the state government’s balance sheet.
Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution in the “old party microphone”?
It was only at the end of May that the state announced the repurchase of the land planned for Intel’s semiconductor factory on the outskirts of Magdeburg. Meffert says that some medium-sized companies would have liked the resources that were used by the state government to implement the 30 billion euro project for their own needs. But is it worth the risk of bringing a party that has been classified as right-wing extremist by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution in Saxony-Anhalt into government responsibility for your own interests?
When the microphone at the election forum in Halberstadt rattled after almost an hour, CDU man Heuer said that it was probably an “old party microphone”. “Perhaps the Office for the Protection of the Constitution was directly involved,” replies Siegmund, causing hilarity in the room. When Olaf Meister, the Green Party’s top candidate for the state election, warned at the end that “right-wing extremists also do right-wing extremist things,” many in the room groaned. “Stop it,” one participant said.
The warnings about right-wing extremists in the ranks of the AfD are met with a shake of the head. “Nobody believes that anymore,” says an entrepreneur later in a conversation at the hotel bar. When asked about the staff who are warming up for ministerial offices in Magdeburg immediately behind Siegmund, some still frown. It remains to be seen how many sympathizers of the AfD’s top candidate share his election goal of “45 percent plus X” for a sole government that evening.
“We finally want our good old country back, and that’s why we want to do it alone,” says Siegmund in the final round of the election forum and also receives applause for this. After the event, an entrepreneur takes a selfie with Siegmund and Wittig, the BSW’s top candidate. The two were the only candidates to speak plainly that evening, says the entrepreneur. Soon he wants to invite Siegmund and Wittig to his vineyard together.
