Angela Merkel Wins Mandate For 4th Term Despite Diluted Support

Preliminary results show German voters gave Chancellor Angela Merkel a mandate for a fourth term Sunday, but with far fewer votes than needed for her to govern without forming a coalition.

Merkel had campaigned on her record as a highly respected leader not only in Germany, but also internationally, as well as record low unemployment and strong economic growth. But German unhappiness over her refugee policy that allowed more than a million asylum seekers into the country since 2015 was something she never fully recovered from.

"Merkel has become a very polarizing figure, something she never envisioned for herself, never saw happening," said Merkel biographer Stefan Kornelius, who is also foreign editor of Germany's daily Suedeutsche Zeitung. "As much as she pushed to the center on the refugee issue and brought in the left part of electoral voters in her camp," she lost voters to the right of the spectrum.

Those voters are among the many Germans who are sending a right-wing nationalist party to the German parliament for the first time since 1957. Preliminary results show Alternative for Germany, which was founded as a euroskeptic party in 2013, coming in third place with about 13 percent of the vote. - More

Angela Merkel Wins Mandate For 4th Term Despite Diluted Support