According to an analysis by the editorial network Germany (RND), the member of the Bundestag was shown a total of ten times in one of the public programs by Frank Plasberg, Anne Will, Sandra Maischberger and Maybrit Illner.
The Greens’ co-chair, Robert Habeck, led the table last year with 13 invitations. Habeck took part in six such discussions this year.
The leader of the youth wing of the SPD party, Juso boss Kevin Kühnert and the chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee, Norbert Röttgen (CDU), share second place with nine appearances each. Former left-wing leader Sahra Wagenknecht (7), FDP chairman Christian Lindner (6) and Greens’ group leader Katrin Göring-Eckardt (7) are also in the upper part of the table.
Representatives of the AfD, however, were rarely invited. Former party leader Alexander Gauland has been a guest four times, making him the most frequently invited AfD politician. The AfD had won 12,8 percent of the vote in the recent federal election, while the Greens received 8,9 percent of the vote.
The proportion of political talk show appearances on public television is 17,2 percent for the Greens while by contrast, the AfD is underrepresented at 5,2 percent.
Except for the Greens, which are overrepresented in comparison to their election results, the proportion of talk show appearances is based on the election results of the parties. The Union parties have a seat share of 34,7 percent in the Bundestag and 34 percent in the talk shows. The SPD occupies 21,4 percent of the seats in the Bundestag, and its share in the talk shows is 23,6 percent. The FDP has around 11 percent each. The left is slightly underrepresented. It holds 12,8 percent of the seats in the Bundestag and 8,4 percent in political programs.
The head of the Forsa polling institute, Manfred Güllner, told the RND: “For the AfD, the talk shows are not so important in terms of communication. They tend to address their voters through social media. And fewer appearances on these stages also offer fewer opportunities for AfD staff to make a bad impression.”
In 2019, the CDU had 72, the Social Democrats 69, the Greens 43, the FDP 29, the Left 21, the CSU 14 and the AfD had 13 opportunities to participate in roundtables. The overall record holder is Sahra Wagenknecht with 79 appearances, followed by her party friend Gregor Gysi, who was present 68 times.
The topic “Environment and Climate Protection” was the focus this year with 22 programmes.