marcelzjgr's soup

"The AfD had to show that it's capable of attracting voters in the west and doesn't remain an eastern German protest party. The Hamburg election has been a big success for the AfD," said Oskar Niedermayer, a political-science professor at Berlin'sFree University. "The Free Democrats are struggling to survive and they managed to set a clear signal Sunday that they are still an option." Last year, the populist AfD upstart party gained representation in three eastern German state parliament elections, winning around 10% of the votes in Brandenburg, Saxony and http://asawec.livejournal.com Thuringia. The party was founded in 2013 on a platform that opposes euro-zone bailouts and accuses Ms. Merkel of providing visit too much help for debt-ridden European countries. But over the past months, the AfD has focused more on anti-immigration and crime issues. Ms. Merkel's Christian Democratic Union suffered a bitter defeat in Hamburg, gaining a historic low of 15.9%, but the results are due to regional political issues and aren't a setback for the chancellor, observers said.
More: http://www.nasdaq.com/article/germanys-afd-party-advances-in-state-polls-20150215-00027