Reinickendorf: AfD's Ruschin falls one vote short in Berlin district election
Despite announced CDU support, the AfD politician fell one vote short of becoming deputy mayor. Protesters gathered outside the town hall; the AfD plans to try again on Nov. 18.
Symbolic image · Photo: Havelbaude / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0 (cropped and resized)
In Berlin's Reinickendorf district, AfD politician Thomas Ruschin narrowly failed on Thursday evening to win election to the district office, where he was to become a councillor and deputy mayor. In the district assembly he received 26 of 55 votes in the first round; 28 were needed. Even after two adjournments, the count stood at 27 to 27 with one invalid ballot. Sebastian Pieper (CDU) was elected district mayor in the first round with 45 votes in favor, nine against and one abstention.
The CDU in Reinickendorf had announced it would back Ruschin, a lawyer who switched from the CDU to the AfD in 2020. District CDU chairman Marvin Schulz argued that the AfD won 18 percent in the district and therefore has a claim to a post in the district office. "We have now decided to pursue policy on the merits rather than camp politics," Schulz said. He said this was neither a coalition nor cooperation with the AfD.
The SPD called it the breaking of a taboo; former SPD district chairman Jörg Stroedter told Bild: "Then the firewall falls!" People protested against the AfD outside Reinickendorf town hall. AfD district chairman Rolf Wiedenhaupt said Ruschin would be nominated again at the next session of the district assembly on Nov. 18.