Foundation in Berlin (presentation of the board candidates) The party was founded on 10 September 2006 by students and young people inspired by the recently founded
Swedish Pirate Party.
Rise In June 2009,
Bundestag member
Jörg Tauss left the
SPD and joined the Pirate Party after the was passed, but left the Pirate Party in 2010 when he was convicted for possession of
child pornography. In late August 2009,
Herbert Rusche, one of the founding members of the
German Green Party and, in the 1980s, the first openly gay member of parliament in Germany, joined the Pirate Party. The party first began to contest elections in 2009; firstly in the
2009 European Parliament election in Germany and then the
2009 German federal election. Although the party received no seats in either election, the pirates performed well in the Federal election, obtaining 1.95% of the vote. This was the best showing of any party without any national representation. Budding support for the party was galvanised by activism against online censorship laws introduced in Germany that year. The result impressed journalists, who began speculating that the Pirates could have the same trajectory as
the Green Party, beginning as a single-issue protest party before transforming into a deeper organisation. The results shocked even the party itself and a wave of euphoria washed over the membership. The election in Berlin, held in September, had coincided with the start of the international
Occupy Movement, and many journalists attributed the same sentiment fueling the Occupy Movement as also providing support for Pirate Parties internationally. In the Spring of 2012, the Pirates won seats in three other German federal states and by August 2012 the party had around 35,000 members. National polling showed surging support for the party with the
Irish Times referring to the Pirates as "the third most popular party in Germany" following a poll by
Stern magazine which placed the party on 13% national support. This would functionally be the high watermark for the party, which subsequently went into a steady decline • the party's libertarian and anti-authoritarian nature made it difficult for strong leadership to be established This prompted Reda to resign from the party and politics in general, announcing his decision on 27 March 2019, in an online video protesting the party's inaction on the matter. Following Reda's resignation and withdrawal, the party continued its electoral decline at the local, state, federal, and European level. In recent years, the party has come under heavy criticism from other Pirate parties and prominent figures of the global
Pirate movement for its handling of various issues and controversies, and its stance on international topics like the
Gaza genocide and the
Israeli occupation of the West Bank, with
Andrew Norton,
Birgitta Jónsdóttir, the
Pirate Party of Greece, and the
United States Pirate Party being especially vocal. The
2025 German federal election marked its terminal decline, as it received only 0.03% of the national vote (13,800 total voters), losing 91.86% of the votes it attracted in the
2021 federal election.
2009 federal election On 27 September 2009, the Pirates received 1.95% (845,870 votes) in the
2009 German federal election, thus not securing any seats in the Bundestag. However, this was still the best result among parties that did not meet the 5% threshold. Among first-time male voters, the party received 13%. On account of the election results in 2009, the party met the conditions for receiving
public allowances, a status it lost in 2024. For 2009, it received €31,504.68 (the same amount as it received from private contributions) which was exclusively due to the Pirates state associations Saxony and Schleswig-Holstein. The calculation was made based on the total receipts of the party in 2008. The possible upper limit of the public allowance matching for the party is a rate of €840,554.51.
2009 European Parliament election It received 229,117 votes in the
2009 European Parliament election, which was 0.9%, but not enough for a seat.
State and regional elections On 30 August 2009, the Pirates received 1.9% in the
2009 Saxony state election. On the same day, the party also received one seat in each council in the local elections of
Münster and
Aachen, although candidates of the party ran for office only in some constituencies of both cities. Support for The Pirates differs somewhat between States. The party received 1.8% in the
2009 Schleswig-Holstein state election and 1.5% in the
2010 North Rhine-Westphalia state election (though without securing seats), but only 0.5% in the
2009 Hesse state election and did not participate in the
2009 Brandenburg and
Saarland state elections. The party received 2.1% in the
2011 Hamburg state elections, though it was not yet enough to gain seats in the State parliament. In the
2011 Baden-Württemberg state election the Pirate Party was able to repeat this result. In the
2011 Saxony-Anhalt state election they received 1.4% or 13,828 votes; in the
2011 Rhineland-Palatinate state election they achieved 1.6% of the votes. In the
2011 Berlin state election, with 8.9% of the votes the
Pirate Party of Berlin managed for the first time to overcome the 5% threshold and to win seats (numbering 15 out of 141 seats in the ) in a German state parliament. This was quite a surprise for them, since they only had 15 candidates on the ballot. In response to their election, however,
Mayor Klaus Wowereit criticized their lack of diversity, most notably the lack of women in the party. In March 2012, the Pirates received 7.4% of the vote and thus won four seats in the
Landtag of Saarland. In May 2012, they won 8.2% of
the vote in Schleswig-Holstein, which was sufficient to enter the state parliament, gaining six seats, being led by
Torge Schmidt from 2013 until 2017. Also in May 2012, they won 7.8% of
the vote in North Rhine-Westphalia, gaining 20 seats.
2013 federal election After those successful state elections, the party was able to score up to 13% in nationwide polls. However, after a string of scandals and internal disputes which were handled unprofessionally and picked up by the media, the party lost the trust of voters and entered a steady decline in polls, from which it never recovered. As a result, in the
Lower Saxony state election in January 2013, the Pirate Party was only able to gain about 2.1% of the votes, missing the 5% threshold needed to gain actual seats in the state parliament. Six months later during the
Bavaria state election of 2013 the Pirates fared similarly, receiving again only 2% of the votes. At the
2013 German federal elections the following weekend, the party suffered another major defeat where it was again only able to achieve 2.2% of the votes, leading to the resignation of party leader
Bernd Schlömer.
2014 European Parliament election – the Pirate MEP for the 2014 to 2019 term In the
2014 European parliament elections, the Pirate Party received 1.45% of the national vote (424,510 votes in total) and returned a single
Member of the European Parliament. The elected MEP,
Felix Reda, joined the
Greens–European Free Alliance as an independent.
2016 Berlin state election The Berlin state election on September witnessed the collapse of support for the Pirate Party in their erstwhile stronghold of Berlin. Their previous vote of 8.9% achieved in 2011 fell to 1.7% and the Pirate Party lost all representation in the Berlin State assembly. The poor result was compounded by the murder-suicide of former Pirate Party assembly member
Gerwald Claus-Brunner.
2017 dropout from state parliaments Together with the satirical party the Pirate Party nominated
Engelbert Sonneborn as candidate for the
German presidential election in February 2017. The Pirate Party continued to decline in 2017, dropping out from state parliaments. In the
Saarland state election in March 2017, the Pirate Party received only 0.7% of the voter share and therefore lost all its seats in the
Landtag of the Saarland. With the
North Rhine-Westphalia state election in which it lost every seat, the Pirate Party is no longer represented in any state parliament.
2019 European Parliament election In the
2019 European Parliament election, the Pirate Party received a 0.65% share of the national vote (243,302 total votes) and retained their MEP seat, with their lead candidate
Patrick Breyer being elected.
2021 federal election In the
2021 federal election, the Pirate Party received 0.37% of the national vote (169,587 votes in total).
2024 European Parliament election In the
2024 European Parliament election, the Pirate Party lost all representation in the European Parliament, receiving 0.47% of the national vote (186,683 votes in total). Due to these results, it lost its eligibility for state funding, as per Section 18 of German Law on Political Parties (Parteiengesetz).
2025 federal election In the
2025 federal election, the Pirate Party collapsed completely, receiving only 0.03% of the national vote (13,800 votes in total). This marks a 91.86% loss of voters compared to the
2021 federal election. confirming its inability to mitigate or reverse its electoral and political decline. == Election results ==