No trace of Olaf Scholz. In one of the last strongholds of the SPD, in constituency 169 in Northern Hesse, the Chancellor and top candidate of the party is practically not posted. Two or three large pictures of him hang on bus stops-where the advertising from the party headquarters in Berlin was booked and paid. Lanterns hung: “First voice Philipp Rottwilm” is there. They are convinced of him, who is the mayor of a small community here. It is the reason why the comrades stand in supermarket parking spaces at just one degree above freezing on Friday afternoon and spread jam glasses with his portrait. A former SPD mayor at one of the stands says: “We compete with a politically dead”-he means Scholz. Nationwide the choice for the SPD has run, he thinks. It is still about defending the old SPD stronghold. But even that is no longer so easy. This evening is about two things: the country’s economic crisis and the threat to democracy. And somehow both are related. In his speech, the DGB district chairman of Hessen-Thuringia, Michael Rudolph, speaks of the mistakes that had made the leadership of the Volkswagen Group. He praises the works council, which, by completing the lead, secured the perspective for the North Hessian plant. There is no question of errors of the SPD-led federal government. Under the skilled workers at VW, the crisis of the car company triggered uncertainty and relegation fears last year. Not everyone choses the AfD, but “the self-evident cross at the SPD”, which was considered long after the Hartz reforms, has become less common, says a trade unionist. “The bond with the SPD is no longer there,” says one who works at VW and is in the SPD the next day. He has been working for the group for ten years, and he is like his parents in the SPD. Family tradition. However, he is now the exception among his colleagues. Under the guests of the New Year’s reception, he is primarily retired teachers and public service employees. If the DGB chairman Rudolph calls it a “dam break” that the Union has accepted votes from the AfD, this will be given a lot of approval. “We won’t accept that quietly and secretly,” says Rudolph. The unions have already been witnesses to a seizure of power. “Mr. Merz, we are the fire wall,” he calls. Later they talk a lot about “this Merz” and the AfD at Hütt beer and sandwiches. Faith-door election campaign: Philipp Rottwilm (right) with Günter Rudolph, the former chairman of the SPD parliamentary group Hessenlucas Bäumlfrieder Schütz, 80, is one of the few who are also critical of the SPD. When he talked to others, he keeps hearing the trouble about the citizens’ allowance and help for asylum seekers. “If the SPD only helps those who do not work, then she shouldn’t be surprised if those who work for the AfD vote,” he says. When an older DGB man is annoyed by the AfD voters and says: “If they go away from the SPD, they switch off their brain right away,” Rottwilm replies: “Oh, stop.” Certainly some of the AfD- Do not regain voters, but you have to fight for the trust of the voters. He talks about what he wants to fight in Berlin: strengthen the economy and do more for rural areas. His counterpart nods and says: “The Philipp is one who is still choosing the SPD.” Election campaign at the baker: Philipp Rottwilm (right) with Mario Gerhold, the mayor of the municipality of Körlelucas Bäumldas, self -image of the SPD in northern Hesse is different from In large parts of the country. Anyone who wants to be set up here must have already profiled themselves in a form, says Edgar Franke. He has been representing the constituency in the Bundestag for 15 years, and he was elected directly. Before that, he was mayor of the city of Gudensberg for ten years. “We have more grip here in the SPD,” he says. He also finds a lot of praise for his potential successor Rottwilm. Rottwilm has been the mayor of the municipality of Neuental for seven years, where he grew up and now lives with his family. “It is grounded. People smell that. ”The Ahlewurst is part of the stable smell. Rottwilm can talk about this North Hessian specialty for minutes, from which house butcher he relates and what matters – rather smoked than air -dried, he says. In his appearance and history, Rottwilm stands for an academically minted, modern SPD – he studied in Oxford and Harvard, was received in economics and worked for the management consultancy KPMG. The rather conservative social democrat emphasizes the end of the shoulder with the workers and fighting for the little people. But he himself is not a climber; His parents are doctors. Rottwilm likes to say that he knows this and that from his time in Berlin, Frankfurt or London. With his wife, whom he met in Oxford, he consciously decided to move back here. Once SPD-Stammland: In the garden of a residential building in Edermünde, a Germany flag is blowing. Lucas Bäumlam Election stand in front of the Rewe market in Neuental are enthusiastic about two older men when it comes to Rottwilm. He had done a lot to develop the industrial area, who was in accordance with the municipality and strengthened the local directors. A project by the mayor is also the redesign of the station forecourt, which is quite old. Because the train didn’t want to change anything, the community tried to buy the place to renew it. According to Rottwilm, negotiations lasted for years. When there was an agreement, the railway jumped off. Not the municipality gets a permit that it can renovate the space with funds from the country – but it still belongs to the train. “I would have liked to have been in federal politics earlier to do what to do that such things didn’t take that long,” says Rottwilm. Before the battle meal: Rottwilm gives a speech at the SPD local association Gudensberg.lucas Bäuml with the owner of the Rewe market, Thorsten Kehr, discusses Rottwilm on the minimum wage. “You can pay 15 euros from me,” says Kehr to the candidate. But then you have to prepare for the products to become more expensive. “Instead of 1.99 euros, the sausage then costs 2.49 euros,” he says. That is not said in the election campaign. Rottwilm listens, praises the tariff autonomy and argues that there must be a lower limit in the wages. Kehr says: “At 15 euros per hour, the lower tariff groups just knock us away.” Kehr’s mother is still a SPD member. The party book is one thing that she absolutely wanted to take with her in the retirement home. Even if Kehr has his problems with the SPD, he estimates Rottwilm. He supported him in the construction of the new market. Rottwilm drinks a smoothie on the Rewe parking lot and then jumps up and down. The cold consumes on the election campaigns. He had to expose one day. Like many campaigners in the country, he drags a cold around with him. The stress, the cold, little sleep. Rural: View of the Besse district in the municipality of Edermünde in the Schwalm-Eder-Kreislucas Bäumlseekeklseeklte from the CDU, Anna-Maria Bischof, is currently at home and takes a short campaign break to regenerate. She coughs on the phone. She absolutely wants to win the constituency, the two weeks until the election has already held out. Your chances are better than ever here in northern Hesse. Examination institutions expect national trends down to constituencies and indicate the likelihood with which this or that party wins. Germany is divided on these cards: the majority of the east, the AfD should win many direct mandates there – the rest of the country Schwarz for the Union. And the constituency 169 in Hesse is gray – insecure for the CDU or for the SPD depending on the institute. A wobbly candidate. What the CDU inspired, the state election in 2023 was in Hesse. The northern Schwalm-Eder district was won for the first time by a CDU man-with only 481 votes ahead. For the SPD candidate Rottwilm, this is an incentive to fight until the last minute. Rottwilm was there: Election advertising at the front door in the Besse district in Edermünde in the Schwalm-Eder-Kreislucas Bäumin Edermünde, rings in the afternoon at the doors of a new building area. “If only a few hundred voices are important, every door counts.” He wants to imagine, he says over and over again. So he presents advertising and Kuli. Direct candidates tend to overestimate their own effect. That says election research. If the trend is like in the current surveys, the Union at 30 percent, the SPD cut off at 15, Rottwilm has hardly any chance. In the village community center, the SPD Gudensberg meets on Friday evening to eat battle. The comrades and men from the men’s singing club paid 22 euros to decide at the buffet between the cooked blood or liver sausage, Mett with onions, bratwurst, meatballs and corrugated meat. Rottwilm keeps a speech too long. When he says, “I still want to do this point”, a comrade breathes heavily. The “taboo break” in Berlin does not move the basis here. More on the subject of further ads of one from the men’s singing club that is there because of the sausage, says that he cannot understand the “Getue in Berlin”. “Migration has to be limited. Point. From. ”He considers Scholz to be“ incapable ”, he doesn’t like Merz. And even if he chose the SPD for a lifetime, he struggles. Maybe he choose the young candidate. This time not because, but even though it is in the SPD.
Go to source