West German federal election, 1976

German federal election, 1976

← 1972 3 October 1976 1980 →
All 518 seats in the Bundestag 260 seats were needed for a majority
Turnout	90.7% (voting eligible)
First party Second party Third party   Leader Helmut Kohl Helmut Schmidt Hans-Dietrich Genscher Party CDU/CSU SPD FDP Leader since 1973 (CDU) 1974 1974 Last election 234 242 42 Seats won 254 224 40 Seat change 20 18 2 Popular vote 18,394,801 16,099,019 2,995,085 Percentage 48.6% 42.6% 7.9% Swing 3.7% 3.2% 0.5%
Party list election results by state: red denotes states where the SPD had the absolute majority of the votes; pink denotes states where the SPD had the plurality of votes; darker blue denotes states where CDU/CSU had the absolute majority of the votes; and lighter blue denotes states where CDU had the plurality of votes
Chancellor before election Helmut Schmidt SPD Elected Chancellor Helmut Schmidt SPD

Helmut Schmidt
SPD

Helmut Schmidt
SPD

Federal elections were held in West Germany on 3 October 1976.

The coalition of SPD and FDP wanted to be re-elected, with the SPD now led by Helmut Schmidt—the party's candidate for Chancellor. CDU and CSU tried to achieve an absolute majority of the votes to make CDU chairman Helmut Kohl Chancellor.

The coalition between the SPD and the FDP remained in government, with Helmut Schmidt as Chancellor. Between the "sister parties" of CDU and Bavarian CSU there emerged a critical conflict, as the CSU leader Franz Josef Strauß wanted to break both the united Bundestag group of the parties and the agreement not to compete against each other in any Land. Later, this attack was withdrawn, while Strauß became candidate for chancellor for the 1980 elections.