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Populists Surge in Germany's East

Jamie Dettmer

   Regional government elections in Germany Sunday, in which the
   anti-immigrant, nationalist far-right AfD party surged in support, are
   testimony to a widening rift between the country's prosperous West and
   its struggling former Communist East, say analysts.

   Thirty years after German reunification -- and an investment by Berlin
   of more than 2 trillion euros in the east -- the coming together of the
   country's two halves has slowed.

   The young and educated are fleeing westward and those left behind say
   they're treated like second-class citizens. They compare their plight
   with the "generosity" they say has been shown by Berlin to the more
   than one million migrants who have settled in Germany since 2015.

   On Sunday, in the states of Saxony and Brandenburg, the AfD capitalized
   on the widening divide, delivering what is being dubbed an "earthquake"
   blow to Chancellor Angela Merkel's shaky government coalition in
   Berlin.

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