ruth901
Elections are not just about parties – but also about personalities. This is evident once again in the current local elections.
Fulda – In addition to the top candidates, completely different names have become the kings of votes in many places. First and foremost: Michael Brand. The CDU member of the Bundestag and State Secretary actually “only” entered the race in fourth place for the district council. In the end he is with the District election right at the top – with a lead of more than 4,000 votes, even ahead of top candidate Thomas Hering. A classic case of official bonus: Anyone who does politics in Berlin and is known in the constituency will also be elected locally.
Things went very similarly, albeit more closely, in the city of Fulda. Thomas Hering, of all people, becomes the CDU vote king – even though the state parliament member was in fourth place on the list. With a lead of 47 votes, he passed city council leader Margarete Hartmann, who topped the list.
Local elections 2026: These are the vote kings in Fulda
In general, it turns out that notoriety is important Local election half the battle. Many well-known faces are specifically voted up by voters – often by several places at the same time. There are plenty of examples at the Union: Neuhof's mayor Heiko Stolz climbs from 9th to 4th place, Flieden's head of administration Christopher Gärtner: from 12th to 7th, Eiterfeld's town hall boss Dana Hauke from 17th to 9th, and Gersfeld's head of the municipality Dr. Steffen Korell moves from 36 to 15.
Winfried Happ's jump is particularly spectacular. The travel entrepreneur from Flieden was originally in 42nd place – actually hopeless with 36 seats. Now he is in 10th place and therefore safely in the district council. Others also benefit from the personal profile: The head of the district farmers' association, Sebastian Schramm, climbs from 34 to 24. Dentist Sascha Engel even makes it from the penultimate third (49th place) directly to the district council – in 29th place.
It's not just the CDU that is experiencing surprises. In the AfD, Neuhofer Martin Hohmann, a former mayor and CDU member of the Bundestag and the face of the alternative for years, moved from 7th place to 2nd place – directly behind Jan Nolte. At the SPD, Birgit Kömpel, also once in the Bundestag, ensures clear conditions: from fifth place on the list, she becomes the vote queen among the Social Democrats – with a lead of more than 1,700 votes over top candidate Michael Busold.
Smaller groups also have their clear winners: Thomas Grünkorn (CWE) won a whopping 2,200 more votes than the runner-up in the district council election. Wilhelm Hartmann, known as the “Ahrtal helper” from the Hartmann gardening company and now head of the Free Voters, is even 2,600 votes ahead.
A particularly exciting picture emerges from the… Election to the Fulda city council. There, the candidates with the highest individual votes come from the second-placed AfD – they are above the best CDU candidate. The reason is probably less political than mathematical: AfD voters apparently concentrate their votes heavily on a few candidates. CDU voters, on the other hand, distribute their votes more widely – including across different lists, so they pander more. In addition, large lists such as those of the CDU or Greens with 50 or more names automatically ensure greater distribution. Smaller lists like that of the AfD with only 22 candidates concentrate the votes more strongly.
Familiarity also pays off outside of big politics. In Fulda, for example, members of the Fulda Carnival Society benefit: from FKG President Oliver Weißenberger to FKG Princess Dr. Isabel Hohmann – both are climbing significantly. And then there is the well-known palliative medicine doctor Dr. Thomas Sitte, who originally ran in the penultimate place on the list – and is now in 21st place. Whether he even expected to move in remains to be seen.
Carnival, medicine and local celebrities – who the voters choose
For the Greens, Jutta Hamberger, daughter of the former CDU mayor, becomes the vote queen on the list – ahead of top candidate Marie-Louise Puls. And at the CWE, which is only allowed to send one representative, Elke Diegelmann overtakes its own top candidate Martin Jahn. Volker Elm, well-known carnivalist and restaurateur, improved significantly and slipped from 4th to 2nd place and thus into the city council.
A look at Hünfeld also shows that it doesn't always have to be big politics: There, postal carrier Michael Göller becomes the vote king for the SPD – with an 880 vote lead over last year's mayoral candidate Mario Wagner. Similar in the municipality of Künzell: Eugen Heidelmeier, mayor of Künzell-Bachrain, catapulted himself from 15th place to 3rd place on the CDU list.
