Depending on the estimate, every second voter could cast their vote in the Bundestag election by letter.

And two weeks before the election on September 26th, many have long since done so.

When the survey institutes measure the political mood in the country, they often also ask who has already voted by letter.

Institutes like Forsa also ask what the person has already chosen to include the result in the survey.

Forsa boss Manfred Güllner described this procedure in a report in the Süddeutsche Zeitung in mid-August.

Timo Steppat

Editor in politics.

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One read that in the office of the Federal Returning Officer in Wiesbaden with a certain concern, as it is called.

Because from the authority's point of view, the institutes are violating the electoral law.

It forbids “to publish the results of voter surveys after voting on the content of the voting decision before the election period has expired”.

Voters could be manipulated by the election result.

For this reason, by-election surveys, which are also based on postal voting surveys on election Sunday and the days before, may only be published after the polling stations have closed at 6 p.m.

Admonition to observe the electoral law

Forsa also does not show the results of the postal voter survey in advance, but expressly allows the numbers to flow into the Sunday question. And the Federal Returning Officer forbade precisely this “aggregated publication” in a letter that was sent to the institutes on August 24 and that the FAZ has received. It is an admonition to observe the electoral law. With reference to Section 32 (2) of the Federal Election Act, the authority points out that a violation is considered an administrative offense and can be punished with a fine of up to 50,000 euros.

Forsa, however, has now filed a lawsuit with the Wiesbaden Administrative Court. The opinion research institute wants to establish that postal voter surveys may very well be included. A decision by the court is expected in the next few days in view of the election in two weeks.

Other institutes such as the Wahlen research group, which collects the surveys for ZDF, apparently took the decision to publish their results only to a limited extent after the election officer wrote.

It is very regrettable that the political sentiments, which are normally listed after the Sunday question, are no longer allowed to be published, it says “On my own behalf” on the website of the institute.

In turn, other institutes such as Infratest dimap ask whether the respondent cast his vote by postal vote.

Then they still ask, as usual, what the person would vote for next Sunday if there were a general election.

This hypothetical question does not violate voting secrecy, as Stefan Merz, responsible for political surveys at Infratest, explains to the FAZ.

More postal voters than ever before

The requests for postal votes have skyrocketed in the past few weeks.

In some federal states, a rate of over 50 percent was already expected.

On the one hand, this has something to do with the corona situation: Many want to avoid contact in election offices, fear that they might be quarantined and therefore not be able to vote.

On the other hand, it is reinforcing a trend that has been going on for years.

In the last federal election in 2017, a good 28 percent of voters cast their votes before election day.

The mood three to four weeks before the election is therefore much more decisive for the actual result.

This also means that election campaigners will find it difficult to turn the trends shortly before the election.