2009 German federal election

Since the 2005 election, Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU) had governed in a grand coalition with the SPD. However, it was her stated goal to win a majority for CDU/CSU and FDP (the CDU/CSU's traditional coalition partner) in 2009.

Foreign minister and Vice-Chancellor Frank-Walter Steinmeier (SPD) was formally nominated as his party's chancellor-candidate at a convention on 18 October 2008.[3] He aimed to form a government in which the SPD was the strongest party, but which also excluded the left-socialist party The Left.[4]

The election campaign was considered exceptionally boring,[5] which may be attributable to a perceived lack of charisma on the part of the leaders of the CDU and SPD.[6] Another reason pointed to for the sedate campaign is that the CDU and SPD both defended the record of their grand coalition, and facing the possibility of having to continue the grand coalition in a friendly manner.[7] Merkel was content with the low-key campaign style, which was largely seen as benefiting her party because of her high approval ratings.[8]

CDU candidate Vera Lengsfeld released a campaign poster featuring herself and Merkel in a way that emphasised their cleavage.[9] The poster bore the slogan "We have more to offer" (German: "Wir haben mehr zu bieten").[10]

On 23 September 2009, four days before the federal elections, German police raided the Berlin headquarters of the National Democratic Party of Germany NPD to investigate claims that letters sent from the NPD to politicians from immigrant backgrounds incited racial hatred. The NPD leader in Berlin defended the letters saying that "As part of a democracy, we're entitled to say if something doesn't suit us in this country."[11][12][13][14]

The federal election was the final and most important election in what is called a Superwahljahr (super election year) in Germany. In addition to the election of a new Bundestag, also scheduled for 2009 were the election to the European Parliament on 7 June, seven local elections on the same day, five state elections and an additional local election in August and September and the election of the president of Germany by the Federal Assembly on 23 May.

Average trend line of poll results from 18 September 2005 to 27 September 2009 with each line corresponding to a political party.

  CDU/CSU

  SPD

  FDP

  LINKE

  GRÜNE

The CDU/CSU and FDP, with an average vote share of around 50% in pre-election polling during the weeks before the election, were clearly ahead of the other traditional coalition partners in Germany, SPD and the Greens.[15]

Party list election results by state: blue denotes states where CDU/CSU had the plurality of votes; purple denotes states where Die Linke had the plurality of votes; and pink denotes states where the SPD had the plurality of votes

Party list results by constituency

The Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the Christian Social Union of Bavaria (CSU), and the Free Democratic Party (FDP) were able to form a centre-right government, with Angela Merkel of the CDU continuing as the chancellor and the leader of the FDP, Guido Westerwelle, becoming foreign minister and vice-chancellor.[19]

The CDU/CSU received a slightly lower proportion than in the previous election, with the Bavarian CSU receiving its lowest vote share in decades.[20] Overall, the CDU/CSU had their worst vote share in 60 years.[21] In contrast, their preferred coalition partner, the liberal FDP, gained nearly 5% points to give it 14.6% of the vote, the best result of its history. The big loser of the election was the SPD, which received its worst result ever in a federal election, receiving only 23% of the total party vote and suffering the biggest percentage loss of any party in German federal election history in 60 years. The two other parties represented in the Bundestag, the Left and the Greens, both made large gains and received the highest vote share of their respective histories. For the first time, The Left won constituency seats outside its traditional stronghold of East Berlin. As a result of the losses by the SPD and the gains by the FDP, the alliance of the CDU/CSU and FDP received an outright majority of seats, ensuring that Angela Merkel would continue as chancellor.

Had the CDU/CSU and FDP failed to win a majority of seats, possible alternative coalitions may have included a continuation of the grand coalition of CDU/CSU and SPD. A traffic light coalition (SPD–FDP–Greens) was specifically ruled out by FDP leader Guido Westerwelle.[22]

Party		Party-list			Constituency			Total seats	+/–
		Votes	%	Seats	Votes	%	Seats
	Christian Democratic Union	11,828,277	27.27	21	13,856,674	32.04	173	194	+14
	Social Democratic Party	9,990,488	23.03	82	12,079,758	27.93	64	146	−76
	Free Democratic Party	6,316,080	14.56	93	4,076,496	9.43	0	93	+32
	The Left	5,155,933	11.89	60	4,791,124	11.08	16	76	+22
	Alliance 90/The Greens	4,643,272	10.71	67	3,977,125	9.20	1	68	+17
	Christian Social Union	2,830,238	6.53	0	3,191,000	7.38	45	45	−1
	Pirate Party Germany	847,870	1.95	0	46,770	0.11	0	0	New
	National Democratic Party	635,525	1.47	0	768,442	1.78	0	0	0
	Human Environment Animal Protection	230,872	0.53	0	16,887	0.04	0	0	0
	The Republicans	193,396	0.45	0	30,061	0.07	0	0	0
	Ecological Democratic Party	132,249	0.30	0	105,653	0.24	0	0	0
	Family Party	120,718	0.28	0	17,848	0.04	0	0	0
	Alliance 21/RRP	100,605	0.23	0	37,946	0.09	0	0	New
	Pensioners' Party	56,399	0.13	0				0	New
	Bavaria Party	48,311	0.11	0	32,324	0.07	0	0	0
	German People's Union	45,752	0.11	0				0	0
	Party of Bible-abiding Christians	40,370	0.09	0	12,052	0.03	0	0	0
	Bürgerrechtsbewegung Solidarität	38,706	0.09	0	34,894	0.08	0	0	0
	The Violets	31,957	0.07	0	5,794	0.01	0	0	0
	Marxist–Leninist Party	29,261	0.07	0	17,512	0.04	0	0	0
	Alliance for Germany	23,015	0.05	0	2,550	0.01	0	0	0
	Free Voters	11,243	0.03	0				0	New
	Christian Centre	6,826	0.02	0				0	0
	Centre Party	6,087	0.01	0	369	0.00	0	0	0
	Party for Social Equality	2,957	0.01	0				0	0
	Alliance of the Centre	2,889	0.01	0	396	0.00	0	0	New
	German Communist Party	1,894	0.00	0	929	0.00	0	0	0
	Free Union				6,121	0.01	0	0	New
	Independents and voter groups				139,275	0.32	0	0	0
Total		43,371,190	100.00	323	43,248,000	100.00	299	622	+8
Valid votes		43,371,190	98.56		43,248,000	98.28
Invalid/blank votes		634,385	1.44		757,575	1.72
Total votes		44,005,575	100.00		44,005,575	100.00
Registered voters/turnout		62,168,489	70.78		62,168,489	70.78
Source: Bundeswahlleiter

Results by state

Second Vote ("Zweitstimme", or votes for party list)

State[23] results in %	CDU/CSU	SPD	FDP	LINKE	GRÜNE	all others
Baden-Württemberg	34.5	19.3	18.8	7.2	13.9	6.3
Bavaria	42.6	16.8	14.7	6.5	10.8	8.6
Berlin	22.8	20.2	11.5	20.2	17.4	7.9
Brandenburg	23.6	25.1	9.3	28.5	6.1	7.4
Bremen	23.9	30.3	10.6	14.2	15.4	5.6
Hamburg	27.9	27.4	13.2	11.2	15.6	4.7
Hesse	32.2	25.6	16.6	8.5	12.0	5.1
Mecklenburg-Vorpommern	33.2	16.6	9.8	29.0	5.5	5.9
Lower Saxony	33.2	29.3	13.3	8.6	10.7	4.9
North Rhine-Westphalia	33.1	28.5	14.9	8.4	10.1	5.0
Rhineland-Palatinate	35.0	23.8	16.6	9.4	9.7	5.5
Saarland	30.7	24.7	11.9	21.2	6.8	4.7
Saxony	35.6	14.6	13.3	24.5	6.7	5.3
Saxony-Anhalt	30.1	16.9	10.3	32.4	5.1	5.2
Schleswig-Holstein	32.2	26.8	16.3	7.9	12.7	4.1
Thuringia	31.2	17.6	9.8	28.8	6.0	6.6

• Faas, Thorsten (2010). "The German Federal Election of 2009: Sprouting Coalitions, Drooping Social Democrats". West European Politics. 33 (4): 894–903. doi:10.1080/01402381003794670. S2CID 154171892.
• Langenbacher, Eric, ed. (2011). Between Left and Right: The 2009 Bundestag Elections and the Transformation of the German Party System. New York: Berghahn Books. ISBN 978-0-85745-222-1. Scholarly studies.
• Reher, Stefanie. "The effect of congruence in policy priorities on electoral participation." Electoral Studies 36 (2014): 158–172. based on 2009 polls; online

• Hansen, Michael A., and Jonathan Olsen. "Rhapsody in Beige: The Impact of SPD Candidate Evaluations on Vote Choice in the 2009, 2013, and 2017 Federal Elections." German Politics 29.2 (2020): 223–243. online
• Schoen, Harald. "Merely a referendum on Chancellor Merkel? Parties, issues and candidates in the 2009 German federal election." German Politics 20.1 (2011): 92–106.

• Official voting results from the Federal Returning Officer
• Opinion poll tracker with data
• Opinion poll tracker with graph and monthly average
• Bundestag Election Candidates
• Analysis of the election by Ingo Schmidt: The German Federal Elections: Centre-Right Wins Majority, Social Democracy Suffers Crushing Defeat, The Left Receives a Boost