This week, State of the Union focuses on the latest round of immigration politics in Germany and voting patterns in the US and elsewhere.
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00:00Hello and welcome to State of the Union, I'm Stephan Grobe in Brussels.
00:10The recent gains of the far right in regional elections in East Germany continue to make
00:15waves this week.
00:17Not that anything productive came out of the ranks of the AFD party, the alternative for
00:23Germany.
00:24It was rather the center-left coalition of Chancellor Olaf Scholz trying to seize back
00:29the initiative.
00:30In an attempt to further crack down on illegal immigration, Germany is now tightening controls
00:36at its borders, undermining, at least for six months, the Schengen system, Europe's
00:42visa-free area of unrestricted movement.
00:46This in reaction to a 33% rise in illegal border crossings, according to the latest
00:52official numbers.
00:54With this move, Berlin hopes to win back voters in the next regional election in East Germany
01:18a week from now.
01:20Meanwhile, the latest row between the EU Commission and Hungary over immigration is about to escalate.
01:26Budapest vowed to retaliation for a 200 million euro fine imposed by the European Court of
01:32Justice over Hungary's treatment of asylum seekers.
01:49Budapest's threats triggered sharp criticism from Belgium and the EU Commission.
02:04No bus transfer has taken place yet, and that might never happen at all.
02:08Yet the recent sharp focus on immigration shows how the rise of populism in elections
02:14in Europe throughout the year is influencing the political debate.
02:19Speaking of debate, in the United States, where far-right populism is making another
02:24run at the presidency, Donald Trump and Kamala Harris faced off in what was probably their
02:31only televised debate.
02:33Polls taken immediately afterwards saw Harris as the clear winner, but the race remains
02:38tight.
02:40A race both campaigns have claimed is all-important for the survival of democracy.
02:46Joining me now is Ben Ansell, political scientist at the University of Oxford, host of the podcast
02:53What's Wrong With Democracy and author of Why Politics Fails.
02:58Welcome to the program.
02:59Thank you so much for having me, Stefan.
03:01So is democracy in decline?
03:04And do the elections of 2024 so far reflect that?
03:08This year, four billion people went to the polls to vote, half of them in countries with
03:14free and fair elections.
03:16And for the most part, the results of those elections should encourage us.
03:21So for example, in Turkey, Erdogan has not succeeded in controlling some of the local
03:28cities.
03:29So he's sort of on the defense.
03:30Narendra Modi, again, in a fair and free election, but one that people thought he was going to
03:34dominate and strengthen.
03:35He did worse than expected.
03:37Last year, PIS in Poland finally lost.
03:40So actually, in lots of places where we were concerned that democracy might be weakening,
03:45it hasn't.
03:46Let's focus on the US presidential elections being just around the corner.
03:51Are identity politics, something typically American, and misinformation tearing democracy
03:57apart?
03:58The kind of identity politics that is used in misinformation that people get excited
04:02about has always been with us.
04:04People have always voted by their demographics.
04:07You know, what we're seeing in the US election with Hispanic and African-American voting
04:11looks pretty similar to 2008, maybe also to the 1990s.
04:15So the fact that people vote their identities is nothing new in American politics.
04:20What's new maybe is the polarization in the media around that.
04:24There has been a special focus this year on first-time voters in the US.
04:32What can we expect from them in the presidential elections?
04:36Kamala Harris has a lead among younger Americans, and that's where she's really changed the
04:42narrative from Joe Biden.
04:43Biden actually did very well, maybe not surprisingly, among senior citizens in America, cut into
04:49Trump's edge there.
04:51But he lost a lot of young voters concerned about Gaza, yes, but also concerned about
04:56inflation, concerned about the housing market, and concerned about voting for somebody in
05:00their 80s.
05:01And so I suspect that we will see many more young people out to vote than we would have
05:06done with Biden, and then in most recent elections.
05:10There's also a growing gender divide when it comes to voting, women voting differently
05:15than men.
05:16How do you explain this?
05:18It's always been true that women and men have voted differently.
05:22But what is new about today is that the gender gap is just enormous, right?
05:27So right now, it looks like there's a 20-point gender gap.
05:31So if you like, Harris is sort of plus 10 with women, and Trump is plus 10 with men.
05:37So that's a huge difference.
05:38Now, women turn out to vote more.
05:40So actually, that's an inbuilt advantage for Kamala Harris.
05:44Why is that happening more this election?
05:47Maybe because of having a woman on the ballot, I think more likely because of abortion.
05:50All right, Ben Ansell, professor at the University of Oxford, thanks for helping us understand
05:54this complex issue.
05:55I appreciate it.
05:56Thank you so much for having me.
06:00One issue that voters are particularly interested in is, according to polls, climate change.
06:06The reason is that more and more people experience firsthand extreme weather events or other
06:11phenomena like sinkholes.
06:15Most recently, an area in central Turkey is troubled by the proliferation of sinkholes
06:20up to more than 2,600.
06:23The cause, most of them, is droughts and uncontrolled use of underground water, typical consequences
06:30of climate change.
06:32Turkish emergency management authorities are closely monitoring the development of the
06:36giant holes, looking for ways to prevent their formation.
06:41Now, if you feel the ground beneath you is going away, don't panic.
06:46The collapse process is usually so gradual that you can leave the affected area safely.
06:54That's it for this edition.
06:55I'm Stefan Grober.
06:57Have an excellent week.