BERLIN-Germany's Alternative for Germany scored a historic victory at a regional election on Sunday but it was unclear whether it would secure enough support to form Germany's first far-right government since World War II, according to preliminary results.

With between 44% and 44.5% of the votes, the party ended up ahead of earlier predictions and with more than twice the score of its closest rival, the center-right Christian Democratic Union, and one of the best performances by any party at a state election since the 1950s.

Yet initial estimates suggested the party would fall just short of the absolute majority of seats in the parliament of Saxony-Anhalt, a state of 2.3 million inhabitants in the former East Germany, that would allow it to form a government without the support of other parties.

"It's a historic result... We have very clearly received a mandate to govern," AfD's co-chairwoman, Alice Weidel, said. Even if the party fell just short of a majority of seats, she added, it would reach out to conservative state lawmakers who might support an AfD-led government.

The figures could evolve in the AfD's favor through the evening as the votes are counted. A key factor will be whether a small far-left party reaches the 5% threshold needed to enter parliament.

The figures could evolve in the AfD's favor through the evening if some smaller parties failed to reach the 5% threshold needed to enter parliament.

The ballot is a stinging setback for Chancellor Friedrich Merz's government in Berlin, one of the most unpopular in recent history, and marks a new milestone in the shrinking of the political center that has made Europe's largest economy increasingly difficult to govern.

The CDU looked to have halved its 2021 score in the state. Nationally, the party is between five and six points behind the AfD, which has increased its lead recently as Germany's most popular party.

The AfD's apparent victory-the party's best performance at an election since its creation 13 years ago-could shatter the political firewall that has kept the group out of power as all other parties refused to form a coalition with it, even as it leads in national polls.

The party's populist agenda includes speeding up the deportation of undocumented migrants, increasing welfare benefits for native-born Germans, ending sanctions on Russia and German aid to Ukraine, and pulling the country out of the European Union.

Many of these are beyond the powers of a state government. Still, the AfD has pitched the election as a chance to show it can govern and implement policies outside of the mainstream consensus that has endured in the postwar era.

If the AfD lacks the 42 seats in the Saxony-Anhalt parliament that would allow it to form a government, it could get help from the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance, or BSW. The small far-left party said on Sunday evening it could support an AfD minority government in certain policy areas without participating in the government. It was unclear whether the BSW would reach the minimum number of votes needed to enter parliament.

Alternatively, the AfD could try to persuade some CDU lawmakers in parliament to cross the aisle and support an AfD-led government, as Weidel suggested. The CDU in Eastern Germany is riven by conflicts about whether or not to cooperate with the AfD.

Asked whether he was still committed to the firewall, Sven Schulze, the outgoing CDU governor of the state, declined to answer, telling the ZDF public-sector broadcaster that his party would need to analyze the reasons for its defeat.

A collapse of the firewall in Eastern Germany would be a disaster for Merz and could end up fracturing one of the most successful parties in Germany's postwar history, possibly even endangering his chancellorship.

Merz has staked his political future on not entering any alliance with the far-right party, but analysts say he could struggle to impose his will on some of the party's regional branches.

An AfD government in one of Germany's smallest states wouldn't interfere with policymaking at the federal level. Saxony-Anhalt has little weight in Germany's upper house, which represents the regions, and little economic significance.

However it would give the party power over the police and the state branch of the office for the protection of the constitution, the German domestic intelligence agency. One of the tasks of the agency has been to surveil the AfD, which it considers an extremist organization.

The prospect of a Russia-friendly party gaining access to secret intelligence has alarmed security officials in Berlin and across the country.

Georg Maier, interior minister of nearby Thuringia, told The Wall Street Journal that AfD lawmakers in his state had repeatedly requested classified information about defense installation, antidrone measures, and Russian espionage activities in the region, using a parliamentary procedure that compels the government to respond.