Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance

The Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance – Reason and Justice (German: Bündnis Sahra Wagenknecht – Vernunft und Gerechtigkeit [beː.ɛsˈveː], BSW) is a political party in Germany founded on 8 January 2024. It has been described as a left-wing to far-left party with populist and nationalist tendencies. The BSW is skeptical of green politics, criticizes support for Ukraine in the Russo-Ukrainian War, and holds Eurosceptic and anti-American views on foreign policy. The party is considered "left-conservative" or "left-authoritarian", as it combines economically socialist values with cultural conservatism and social conservatism on social issues.
The party originated as a split from the party The Left (Die Linke). In September 2023, Sahra Wagenknecht, Amira Mohamed Ali, Christian Leye, Lukas Schön, and several other long time Left party members announced their intention to form a new party. It was subsequently joined by others including former Left party leader Klaus Ernst, Fabio De Masi, and former mayor of Düsseldorf Thomas Geisel. The Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance was officially founded in January 2024 with Wagenknecht and Mohamed Ali as its leaders. In February, they formed a group in the Bundestag.
The BSW contested its first elections in May. In June, the party won 6.1% of votes nationally in the European Parliament elections. In September, it won between 11% and 16% in three eastern state elections in Saxony, Thuringia, and Brandenburg. As of 2025, the BSW is part of governing coalitions in two states: Thuringia (Blackberry coalition) and in Brandenburg (Red–purple coalition). In the 2025 German federal election, the party received 4.981% of second votes, narrowly missing the 5% threshold required to be allocated seats in the Bundestag.
Wagenknecht, who has been described as a prominent left-wing politician, was a member of The Left and its predecessors, such as the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) and the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS); her political positions are generally identified as left-wing populist. Although she was co-leader of The Left from 2015 to 2019, conflict with other party members on topics, such as the German refugee policy, COVID-19 vaccination, and the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine, had led to speculation since 2021 that she would leave The Left and found a new political party.
Speculation increased in the run-up to the 2023 Hessian state election and the 2023 Bavarian state election on 8 October, in which The Left failed to reach the 5% electoral threshold while the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) surged in both. The success of the AfD led Wagenknecht to claim that a left-wing populist party could compete with the AfD while also respecting the German constitution.
Sahra Wagenknecht blames Die Linke's successive electoral failures (the party's national share of the vote having fallen from 12% in 2009 to 5% in 2021) on its emphasis on policies to combat sexist, racist or homophobic discrimination, to the detriment of economic issues. She argues for the primacy of the latter, in contrast to the intersectional approach of the party's leadership, which uses the term "classism" to refer to the social question as a form of discrimination, in the same way as sexism or racism. In her view, the working classes no longer recognize themselves in the discourse of the left, and are turning to the far-right AfD party as a receptacle for the protest vote.
The association BSW – Für Vernunft und Gerechtigkeit e.V., based in Karlsruhe, was entered in the association register at the district court in Mannheim on 26 September 2023. In mid-October, over fifty members of The Left submitted an application for Wagenknecht's exclusion from the party in order to prevent her from building a new party with the resources of The Left.
Members of the party and political commentators blamed the ongoing speculation about the founding of a new party and the resulting breakup of the Left for its poor results in the state elections. Martin Schirdewan, federal chairman of The Left and co-chair of The Left in the European Parliament – GUE/NGL, declared that the party would expel members who committed to the founding of a rival party by BSW. The Federal Executive Board of The Left passed a resolution of incompatibility with BSW.
Shortly after the press conference was announced, a fake website was registered under www.bswpartei.de that presented itself as the official website of the party, using copyrighted imagery and Wagenknecht's office address in its imprint. Wagenknecht filed a criminal report against the website, which is now offline. It is still unclear who created it.
Members of BSW in the German Bundestag want to continue working as a parliamentary group and have submitted a corresponding application to the President of the Bundestag. When the Wagenknecht Group was constituted in the Bundestag on 11 December 2023, Wagenknecht was elected its chair, Klaus Ernst its deputy chair, and Jessica Tatti its parliamentary managing director. The association also started being represented in the Berlin House of Representatives by Alexander King, the Hamburg Parliament by Metin Kaya and, the Parliament of Rhineland-Palatinate by Andreas Hartenfels, a former member of Alliance 90/The Greens.
The party was officially founded on 8 January 2024, followed by a two hour long press conference. This formation process saw the creation of a new website and the publishing of the first party manifesto for BSW. The party also named its lead candidates for the 2024 European Parliament election in Germany and announced that it had already created a full list of candidates due to be approved at the first party conference.
The University of Potsdam developed a political test, BSW-O-Mat (name being a reference to the Wahl-O-Mat by the bpb), based on the first party manifesto. The test was released on the same day as the manifesto.
It was announced on 1 December 2023 that the first party conference is planned to be held on 27 January 2024. Ralph Suikat also commented at the time, that the association had thus far received an amount of donations in the seven figures, this was later clarified to be 1.4 million Euros collected during the whole of 2023. The majority (90%) of which were small donations, only 12,000 € in total were donated from non-EU foreign countries, thereof 75 € in total from Russia.
On 27 January 2024, the party held its first party conference and invited 450 of its founding members. The party elected its executive committee and formulated a draft program for the 2024 European Parliament election in Germany, which included criticisms of the European Union in its current form and demands for more decision-making power to the member states and significant restriction of migration to Germany. The party won six seats, and saw particular strength in East Germany.
The ten BSW members of parliament represented in the German Bundestag were elected to parliament via the respective state lists of the Left Party. They were recognized as a parliamentary group on 2 February 2024. It bears the name Gruppe BSW im Bundestag and had already constituted itself internally on 11 December 2023. Wagenknecht was elected chairwoman, Klaus Ernst as deputy chairman and Jessica Tatti as parliamentary manager. The other MPs in the group are Amira Mohamed Ali, Ali Al-Dailami, Sevim Dağdelen, Andrej Hunko, Christian Leye, Żaklin Nastić and Alexander Ulrich.
With Alexander King (Berlin House of Representatives), Metin Kaya (Hamburg Parliament) and Andreas Hartenfels (Rhineland-Palatinate State Parliament) the party is also represented in three state parliaments through defections. With the switch of Katja Wolf to the BSW in March 2024, the party provided the mayor of the city of Eisenach in Thuringia until the end of June 2024, because she did not run again in the local elections in Thuringia in May 2024 and instead ran as the top candidate for the BSW in the Thuringian state elections in September 2024. The BSW has been represented in the European Parliament with six seats since July 2024. The six BSW members elected to the European Parliament are Fabio De Masi, Thomas Geisel, Michael von der Schulenburg, Ruth Firmenich, Jan-Peter Warnke and Friedrich Pürner. The formation of a parliamentary group together with the Five Star Movement in Italy failed; the members do not belong to any parliamentary group in the European Parliament. In February 2025, Friedrich Pürner resigned from the party. In September 2024, the BSW achieved a double-digit share of the vote and third place in the state elections in Saxony, Thuringia and Brandenburg. In February 2025 the party fell just below the 5% threshold to win seats in the German Bundestag, and thus lost all their representation. A few weeks later they distantly failed to reach 5% in the Hamburg state election, and lost their seat.
Since December 2024, the BSW has been involved in state governments in Brandenburg (Woidke IV Cabinet) and Thuringia (Voigt Cabinet) for the first time.
In September 2024, BSW faced its first large electoral test in Landtag elections in the states of Brandenburg, Saxony and Thuringia. In Saxony and Thuringia, the BSW came in third place. In Brandenburg, the BSW competed with largely unknown candidates. Although 13 BSW candidates were elected to the state parliament on September 22, their names were missing from the state party's homepage before and after the election.
On 11 December 2024, Dietmar Woidke formed the Woidke IV Cabinet in Brandenburg and the first nationwide red–purple coalition with the BSW was formed. In Thuringia, a Blackberry coalition was formed.
The 2025 federal election was initially scheduled for September, but was moved up to 23 February following the collapse of the governing traffic light coalition. The Bundestag was formally dissolved on 27 December.
During the election campaign, the public broadcaster ARD invited the most promising top candidates from the parties to a TV debate called the "Election Campaign Arena" on 15 February 2025, however BSW was excluded. Sahra Wagenknecht filed a constitutional complaint to ensure that the BSW was also invited. However, the courts decided that the BSW did not have a significance comparable to that of the other invited parties at that time.
In the summer months of 2024, the BSW polled at over 10% of the vote, and polled as high as 7.9% as late as 5 February, but the party ultimately received 4.9% of the vote, coming just short of the 5% threshold that would have entitled the party to Bundestag seats. Wagenknecht's former party, The Left, recorded its best result since 2017, 8.8%, following a late surge in momentum. The BSW would only outperform The Left in Saxony-Anhalt, doing poorer than The Left in all other states.
After the federal election, Wagenknecht left open what the result meant for her and her party. She did not appear publicly, with the BSW's co-chair Amira Mohamed Ali delivering the post-election press statements. Before the election, Wagenknecht had said "The election is of course also a decision about my political future. Anyone who is not in the Bundestag is no longer a relevant factor in German politics."
In BSW official statement at the federal press conference the day after the election, Sahra Wagenknecht blamed the media and the polling institute Forsa for the failure. A "negative media campaign" had contributed to the failure of her party. In addition, she claimed that the polling outfit Forsa had always reported BSW vote shares that were too low in its poll results and had engaged in "targeted manipulation". Wagenknecht's accusations were hardly taken into account; the DJV called them "absurd".
She also stated that she sees the result "as a mandate to further develop the BSW and lead it into the Bundestag by 2029 at the latest". Jürgen W. Falter attributed the party's defeat to "internal factional struggles and resignations", pointing to Wagenknecht's dispute with Katja Wolf, BSW's regional chairperson in Thuringia.
On 11 March 2025, the party appealed to the Federal Constitutional Court for a recount of the election, arguing that because of the irregularities that were found in the preliminary results, it might have crossed the 5% threshold. The appeal for nationwide recount came after isolated recounts of polling stations in North Rhine-Westphalia produced 1,295 additional votes for the BSW. Irregularities were found in other states as well - in Brandenburg, post-election corrections resulted in the BSW claiming 218 more votes; corrections also had to be made in polling stations of places such as Aachen, Lahn-Dill-Kreis, and Duisburg. On 13 March, the Federal Constitutional Court ruled that the appeals for a recount from BSW and voters' committees were inadmissible; the ruling noted that an election review is a matter for the Bundestag and not the Federal Constitutional Court, and is only available after the final elections results are announced.
On 14 March 2025, the Federal Returning Officer released the final results of the 2025 parliamentary election - BSW's vote margin increased to 4.981%. Compared to the preliminary results from February, the party gained 4,277 votes after isolated corrections. Final results benefited the BSW in particular, as 57% of revised second votes were assigned to the BSW. In contrast, the margins of major parties such as CDU and SPD only changed by a few hundred votes. Following the announcement of final results, the BSW announced that it will continue to contest the election by filing an appeal to the Bundestag electoral commission, and then again to the Federal Constitutional Court if necessary. It stated its belief that a recount is necessary and that a thorough inspection could show that it crossed the 5% threshold. According to BSW, despite no irregularites being detected at first, a recount in Marzahn-Hellersdorf still found two additional votes for the party, which would amount to 15,000 votes if extrapolated nationwide.
The BSW has a unique organisation compared to other parties in Germany. Compared to its electoral performance, it has a small and intentionally limited membership base. Unlike other parties, BSW distinguishes between full members and "registered supporters". Applicants for membership must be vouched for by an existing member, and all applications must be approved by the party's federal executive board. The membership was initially capped at 450, most of them being close associates of Wagenknecht and party functionaries with the aim to build the party. In March 2024, the party had 17,000 registered supporters, 8,000 applications for membership, and 500 full members. The party aimed to have "no more than" 1,000 members by the end of the year, and only around 2,000 by the 2025 German federal election. At that time, Wagenknecht explained: "We just make sure that no one comes in who doesn't share our program or who would appear destructive and chaotic."
Journalists were barred from the founding conferences of the state associations in Lower Saxony and Bremen.
The first party executive elected in February 2024 is as follows:
The BSW has been variously described as populist, socialist, economically socialist, anti-capitalist, cultural conservative, social-conservative, anti-immigration, left-wing populist, left-wing nationalist, Eurosceptic,, pro-Russia and left-conservative. The latter label is used in part due to its far-left economic positions and right-wing stances on some social issues, which have been described by Wurthmann as being popular among anti-establishment and right-leaning voters. Research by Wondreys, March, and Pytlas, published in the British Journal of Politics and International Relations, classified BSW as a part of the European radical left, and noted that the party originates from the "reform communist" faction within Die Linke led by Wagenknecht, which was in conflict with the democratic socialist majority faction.
On the left–right political spectrum, the party is widely regarded as a far-left party. It is also described as hard left. Some also consider it left-wing, while others argue that the party is conservative on some cultural issues such as immigration and gender; this combination of stances has been compared to those of Old Left parties such as the Socialist Party (SP) in the Netherlands and the Communist Party of Greece (KKE). Sarah Wagner, a lecturer in political science at Queen's University Belfast, and a former postdoctoral researcher at the University of Mannheim, who has studied Wagenknecht's political rise, commented: "We can't really say exactly how many people align themselves with left-conservative values. But what we can say is that it's a significant group. We have never seen this combination in a party in Germany before." Carsten Linnemann (CDU) described Wagenknecht as a "left, and/or right-wing extremist" and a "communist". The Guardian described the party as "combining both leftwing and rightwing policies – campaigning on everything from more generous pensions and an increase in the minimum wage to constraining climate protection measures and toughening asylum regulations".
In response to descriptions of the party as far right or socially right-wing, political scientist Thorsten Faas said that Wagenknecht was still a politician with a left-wing profile, even within the Left Party, and commented: "I would be a bit cautious about that, because it is of course a clearly left-wing project. This is certainly not a politician who represents a right-wing position." Aiko Wagner describes BSW as a "socio-economic left-wing and socio-cultural right-wing party", which he classifies as left-wing authoritarian. Political scientist Thorsten Holzhauser argues that "the party places itself in the populist tradition of the German left", but that the party's "language and programme show a high degree of syncretism". Holzhauser compares BSW to the Bulgarian Socialist Party under Korneliya Ninova and the Slovak SMER party. The Green European Journal described the BSW as a representative of "conservative socialism" which "combines socialist economics, anti-immigration views, scepticism towards minority rights (including sexual and gender minorities), and anti-elite populist rhetoric." Holzhauser adds that the party's idelogy reflects a specific kind of "conservatism", which seeks to "preserve the old orthodox ideology of the East German state." Jürgen W. Falter wrote that BSW is "nationalist and socialist in one".
Political scientist Hajo Funke rejects labelling BSW as either syncretic or right-wing, arguing that the party is "pragmatic, socially and economically left-wing, and peace-policy-oriented." Funke also questions the "left-wing conservative" label, arguing that the conservative positions of the BSW such as restrictive attitude towards immigration reflect "the consensus of the established democratic parties". Similar opinion was expressed in the Zeitschrift für Parteienwissenschaften by Marco Bitschnau, who wrote:
Away from the right-left classification, the historian lko-Sascha Kowalczuk refers to the authoritarian idea of the state of the Wagenknecht party. Wagenknecht's political background as a communist determines the basic political ideas and goals of the BSW, which are anti-democratic. The BSW strives for a strong, authoritarian state that "contains, patronizes and homogenizes society", Kowalczuk wrote. This would address people in Eastern Germany whose political ideas were embossed in GDR and characterized by the endorsement of a "strong state".
The political positions of the BSW include further restrictions on immigration, a plan for deglobalisation, opposition to green politics, ending military aid to Ukraine, and a negotiated settlement to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Wagenknecht considers the BSW to stand primarily in opposition to Alliance 90/The Greens. In an interview with the Süddeutsche Zeitung, Wagenknecht stated that her party is "obviously not right-wing", instead being left-wing in the sense of "striving for more social justice, good wages, decent pensions" and "a foreign policy that returns to the tradition of détente instead of relying more and more on the military card". However, Wagenknecht omitted the label left-wing (links) within the name of the new party, saying that "many people today associate [it] with completely different content" and with "elitist debates", and that the BSW would appeal to a "broad spectrum of potential voters". Wagenknecht felt that The Left had become socially liberal and what she called "left-lifestyle" rather than left-wing, and accused progressives in The Left of being "too focused on diet, pronouns, and the perception of racism" as opposed to "poverty and an ever-growing gap between rich and poor."
The party's economic program focuses on economic justice, reducing social inequality, and wealth redistribution; its demands include redistributing the wealth to German workers, rolling back neoliberal policies and protecting domestic industries and workers from global market pressures. It is skeptical of capitalism as a socioeconomic system. Wagenknecht published a five-page manifesto that also focused on deteriorating bridges and roads, bad mobile phone reception and internet, and overwhelmed administrations. The BSW claims to represent the interests of "low earners" and supports "public welfare-oriented politics", where welfare would stand above "egoistic interests". BSW is strongly critical of growing social injustice, the power and influence of multinational corporations, and the German taxation system, which it decries as unfair. It calls for state intervention against market-dominating companies and infringing "digital monopolists", listing Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft and Apple as examples; it argues that large corporations undermine democracy and must be broken down. The BSW rejects market economy, denouncing it as a system that causes concentration of wealth in the hands of the few and leads to a situation where companies reach record dividends "while the queues in front of food banks become longer and longer". The party states that until now, "redistribution worked from the hard-working to the upper 10,000". As a solution, it proposes additional taxation of the wealthy, dissolution and decentralisation of large companies, and anti-lobbyism laws.
The party's economic proposals include the demand to break away from the capitalist system, redistribution of wealth and economic interventionism. The main economic theme of the party is social justice - it presents itself as a defender of the poor and proposes social measures to protect the disadvantaged groups. It calls for an economically oriented towards "the common good", advocates a fair wage policy and extensive social security system. For BSW, the main reason behind current wealth inequality were neoliberal reforms and globalisation, which oriented the economy towards low-paid basic service jobs that came to represent the majority of the workers. This also marked the emergence of "knowledge societies" composed of elite universities' graduates, which do not experience economic hardship. According to BSW, markets and competition are no longer functioning, as "financial groups" consolidated power and have imposed their laws on society and "destroyed democracy". The party advocates a new economic system where the market would be severely limited, and where the groups that hitherto dominated it would be broken.
The party is considered to have some culturally conservative stances, such as its opposition to immigration, scepticism of gender-inclusive language and transgender rights. The party presents its anti-immigration stance as a way to protect the German welfare state, arguing that it needs social solidarity to function that mass immigration could disturb. Wagenknecht argued: "The stronger the welfare state, the more of a sense of belonging there must be. Because if people have no connection to those who receive social benefits, then at some point they will refuse to pay for those benefits."
Wagenknecht considers supporting immigration a "market liberal" stance rather than a left-wing one, arguing: "[t]he CDU of Angela Merkel stands for flexibility, economic liberalism, globalisation and high levels of migration, i.e. a policy that weakens cohesion and valuable mutual connections that previously offered people security and support". The party believes that immigration is exploitative as it represents a net loss for countries of origin, seeing it as a "convenient way for rich countries to cream off human resources". At the same time, the BSW argues that immigration lowers the quality of life in Germany due to not only welfare expenses, but also a lack of places in schools and housing. To Wagenknecht, the welfare state is based on citizens' loyalty and their willingness to pay taxes, and "if there is no longer any difference between citizens and non-citizens of a country, there is of course no longer any duty of a state to protect its population in a special manner". She argues that the result is a removal of welfare and social support.
The party is highly critical of gender-inclusive modifications of the German language. Wagenknecht argued that while everyone "should live their own way", Germany has an issue where "people with a traditional family no longer feel valued and someone who is white, male and heterosexual almost has to apologize for it". She advocated a "gender ban" in schools and public institutions on example of the one enacted in Bavaria by Markus Söder, which enforces the usage of traditional German grammar in regards to gender. The party is also against loosening regulations on legally changing one's gender; Wagenknecht believes that such a law "turns parents and children into guinea pigs for an ideology that only benefits the pharmaceutical lobby."
Wagenknecht seeks to distance herself and her party from what she considers "lifestyle leftists" that focus on identity politics and "an attitude of moral superiority", at the cost of neglecting blue-collar workers and the poor. She argues that mainstream left-wing parties abandoned "globalisation losers", which she defines as workers disadvantaged by migration pressures and overseas market competition. Wagenknecht identifies this "lifestyle leftism" as the main reason behind the rise of right-wing populism in Europe:
The BSW accuses other left-wing parties of elitism and the "new education privilege", stating that they have become dominated by urban academia and no longer represent the lower socioeconomic classes of society. The party stresses solidarity, contrasting the "somewheres" - workers that feel attachment to particular states and regions - with "anywheres", the "globalised elites". The party puts an emphasis on traditional family values and regional identities, criticizing social progressivism as an extension of market-liberal policies that "weaken cohesion and valuable mutual connections that previously offered people security and support".
The party is described as pro-China. The BSW also strongly supports the economic and industrial policies of the Chinese Communist Party, describing them as "an exemplary model for how to manage a national economy". The BSW strongly criticizes the involvement of German troops in the South China Sea, opposing proposals to deploy ships there and calling for negotiations instead.
The party is highly skeptical of globalisation and European integration, criticizing the European Union as vulnerable to lobbying, undemocratic in its decision-making system, and economically unfair to the lower classes. The BSW advocates greater national sovereignty and denounces European federalism, with Wagenknecht stating: “The call for ‘an end to the nation-state’ is ultimately a call for ‘an end to democracy and the welfare state’.” The party opposes the EU "not only because the EU is fundamentally anti-democratic and prone to oligarchic capture, but because it cannot be otherwise, given that today the nation-state remains the main source of people’s collective identity and sense of belonging, and therefore the only territorial institution (or at least the largest) through which it is possible to organise democracy and achieve social balance."
Amidst the Israel–Hamas war, Wagenknecht described the Gaza Strip as an "open-air prison". In an August 2024 interview she stated "I will always defend Israel's right to exist. [Israel does have the right to defend itself against] Hamas and its terrible attack in October. But the campaign of destruction in the Gaza Strip has long ceased to be self-defence." She also stated that a ceasefire is needed.
In December 2024, the Bundestag decided to better protect the Federal Constitutional Court against political attacks. For this purpose, the structure (16 judges and two senates) was incorporated into the basic law. All of the parties in the Bundestag (CDU/CSU, FDP, A90/Greens, SPD, and The Left) voted for it, except for the far-right AfD and the BSW.
The BSW argued that the "ruling parties" are afraid that they would be punished in the 2025 federal election and described the inclusion of the Bundeverfassungsgericht in the basic law, which can only be changed with a 2/3 majority, as "undemocratic".
BSW also focuses on energy policy, arguing that renewable energies alone will not suffice to cover the energy needs; the party proposes to invest in nuclear power plants in addition. The party argues that while it is concerned about the environment, the German economy is industry-heavy and its energy supply cannot be secured through renewable energies and the usage of traditional fuels should be tolerated to some extent.
Wagenknecht criticized the Scholz cabinet for depriving the German economy of the cheap Russian gas and providing no alternative sources of affordable energy; similarly, BSW is critical of the EU's heating law and plans to ban combustion engine cars – Wagenknecht described these policies as "an attack on citizens' wealth and property; it is poorly thought out, poorly crafted and useless in terms of climate policy". The party rejects environmental and green energy efforts which it considers to be "blind, haphazard eco-activism, which makes people's lives even more expensive but actually does nothing at all for the climate".
BSW's foreign policy has been labelled and criticised as Russophilic, which is denied by Wagenknecht. On the death of Russian opposition politician Alexei Navalny in February 2024, Wagenknecht commented: "The early death of Alexei Navalny is shocking. Even if it is still unclear exactly what Putin's critic died of. One thing is certain: Navalny was a victim of the autocratic system in today's Russia." At the same time, the BSW advocates political détente with Russia, arguing that "Germany’s subordination to the US-Nato proxy war strategy in Ukraine, and refusal to engage in diplomatic talks with Russia, is self-defeating from an economic as well as a geopolitical standpoint". It is particularly critical of oil and gas embargos against Russia, accusing ruling parties of "negligently playing with the security and in the worst case the lives of millions of people in Germany".
The BSW argues that in delivering weapons to Ukraine, the German government failed its collective responsibility to act diplomatically, and accused the Ukrainian government of Nazism. Wagenknecht stated:
BSW is also described as anti-NATO. The BSW is critical of sending weapons to Ukraine and its supporters in the Russo-Ukrainian War, and blames NATO for escalating the conflict. Wagenknecht argued that the war was provoked by "NATO expansionism" and the "unwillingness of Western countries to respond to negotiation readiness by Putin"; BSW rejects sanctions against Russia as driving an economic crisis for the workers. The party attacks NATO as a "militaristic, imperialist alliance par excellence". BSW stated that its opposition to NATO and arming Ukraine stems from its goal to free Germany "from the geostrategic grip of the United States". In December 2024, Wagenknecht declared that she "condemns this war." She "considers politicians who start wars—and that also applies to Vladimir Putin—to be criminals."
In the spring of 2024, in two interviews, Wagenknecht linked the peace negotiations she had called for between Ukraine and Russia with the proposal that the population in Russian-occupied Ukrainian territories should vote on their nationality in a referendum supervised by the United Nations. She also outlined what a peace agreement could look like, and did not rule out security guarantees or a military obligation to provide Ukraine with military assistance if Russia were to break a peace agreement. She could imagine China, Turkey or France as guarantor powers. She also called for Gerhard Schröder's "line to the Russian president" to be used for negotiations. In June 2024 she defended the absence of the BSW MPs from a speech by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in the German Federal Parliament, she described the war in Ukraine as a "proxy war" between NATO and Russia.
Many members and activists within the party were relieved that Wagenknecht was leaving after months of hinting and speculation. Party members criticized BSW members of the Bundestag for not returning back their mandates they had won for The Left. Some politicians of The Left expressed disappointment at the behavior of Wagenknecht's followers. Martin Schirdewan said that he was "personally disappointed" with the defectors, who he said had damaged the party, and called on them to return their seats in the Bundestag to The Left. The Left vice-chairman Lorenz Gösta Beutin described Wagenknecht's formation of the party as motivated by personal financial gain: "The millionaire Wagenknecht is founding a party for Wagenknecht in order to collect corporate donations for a Wagenknecht party."
The council of Left Youth Solid, the youth wing of The Left, was pleased with Wagenknecht's exit from the party, stating: "Our fight has finally paid off: we were longingly awaiting her departure and called on the party to kick her out. The party can now begin the process of renewal." The Left deputy parliamentary group leader Gesine Lötzsch said that a party founded by Wagenknecht should not be viewed as an opponent or enemy but as competition. She said they would look closely at how this party develops and what positions it takes up from The Left. She added: "The real danger that I see is that our country is moving more and more to the right. If The Left parliamentary group no longer exists in the Bundestag, it will be even more difficult to stand against the governing coalition."
The Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) general secretary Kevin Kühnert commented that "Sahra Wagenknecht has been a very established one-woman opposition for 30 years. But there is not a single political measure that is linked to her political activity where something has become better for people", and added that as Wagenknecht is rarely present in the Bundestag, he is not too worried about her new party.
The Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU), which passed a resolution of incompatibility with both The Left and the AfD, discussed ways to deal with BSW. Wagenknecht offered to the CDU a coalition government if there was no majority without the AfD in the 2024 Saxony, Thuringia, and Brandenburg state elections. The Brandenburg CDU parliamentary group leader Jan Redmann said that they should wait and see the next developments, a position that was also reflected by the CDU in Thuringia. CDU deputy party leader Andreas Jung told Die Welt: "Anti-Americanism, proximity to Putin, and socialism are completely incompatible with our stance." Former agriculture minister Julia Klöckner expressed her view that a resolution of incompatibility should also apply to BSW, while Lower Saxony CDU leader Sebastian Lechner stated that there was a need for clarification, as BSW cannot be subsumed under the CDU's incompatibility decision with The Left and AfD, and that Wagenknecht's new party would have to make its own decision. CDU chairman Friedrich Merz said that BSW could take votes from the AfD, while former president Joachim Gauck (who never was a CDU member) commented that BSW could also attract dissatisfied SPD voters.
After the announcement of BSW's formation, the Brandenburg branch of the AfD reportedly feared a loss of votes in eastern Germany for the September 2024 Brandenburg state election.
In Germany, the Bild described Wagenknecht as a right-wing socialist, while Die Tageszeitung said that she promotes "socialism with a right-wing code". Party researchers generally assume that BSW could challenge the AfD for votes due to its views about the COVID-19 pandemic, the Russian invasion of Ukraine, and migration. Deutschlandfunk commented: "For the AfD, a Wagenknecht party would be direct competition that could cost it a few percentage points and reduce its own voter potential among those disappointed by politics. Both the future Die Linke and the AfD lack charismatic figures like Wagenknecht." T-Online commented that, alongside The Left and the AfD, BSW also posed a threat to the centre-right Free Democratic Party of Germany (FDP), with around 26% of FDP voters willing to consider the party. It argued that although the FDP and BSW are opposites on most issues, with the FDP standing for economic liberalism, the bases of both parties are critical of German migration policy.
About BSW attracting AfD voters, Die Zeit stated: "Even if Wagenknecht wants to limit rather than promote immigration, she is not yet known to have openly racist and right-wing extremist attitudes and resentments. In this respect, it would be welcome if at least some of the AfD voters turned to a Wagenknecht party." Similarly, Der Spiegel argued: "If the party is founded, the new movement could lure away voters from the AfD. That would not be a bad thing on the surface: left-wing populism à la Wagenknecht is still better than a party on the far right. That is why they are afraid of the new group there." Handelsblatt commented that Wagenknecht could do what Merz has failed to do, namely "the halving of the AfD". The Green European Journal argued that BSW might contribute to "saving democracy by fighting the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) on its own turf".
In Britain, The Spectator questioned whether Wagenknecht would succeed with her party, citing the "element of the personality cult". The Guardian stated that, along with the surge of far-right AfD in the polls, the rise of Wagenknecht's party signals rising discontent of the general population with the ruling Scholz cabinet, which Wagenknecht described as "the worst government in its history"; according to the polls, if an election were to take place in October 2023, BSW could win up to 20% of the national vote. The newspaper also commented that the new party puts The Left at risk of political irrelevance, as the party has long suffered from infighting and declining electoral returns. Political scientist Andrea Römmele described BSW as "an alternative to the Alternative for Germany", arguing that the party could claim support lost by The Left to the AfD in the new states. Political scientist Benjamin Höhne commented: "The niche BSW is opening up – stressing social justice, and at the same time ... [Wagenknecht] positioning herself in a more migration-sceptical way – has potential." In Italy, the Corriere della Sera described BSW as the "mirror image of the AfD".