Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier dissolved the existing Bundestag on December 27, 2024. This followed the break-up of the governing coalition of the SPD, Alliance 90/The Greens and the FDP.
blue News will be reporting on the election in Germany all Sunday.
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Why is the 2025 election taking place earlier?
Normally, federal elections take place every four years and the last federal election was held in September 2021 - so the new elections were actually planned for September. However, early elections are possible in exceptional cases.
As the incumbent government no longer had a majority in the Bundestag following the break-up, Chancellor Scholz called a vote of confidence in the Bundestag on December 16.
However, he lost this and then asked the Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier to dissolve parliament.
The latter followed the Chancellor's request on December 27 and scheduled an early election for February 23, 2025.
Who can vote for the Bundestag?
All German citizens who have reached the age of 18.
Germans living abroad.
Persons whose right to vote has been revoked by a court ruling, for example in the case of serious criminal offenses, are excluded from voting.
At least 59.2 million Germans are eligible to vote in the February election, of which 30.6 million are women and 28.6 million are men (according to the Federal Statistical Office).
