Thuringian premier Mario Voigt plans to drop lawsuit over revoked doctorate

Mario Voigt, the 49-year-old Minister President of Thuringia, indicated to multiple legislators that he intends to retract his complaint to the Administrative Court in Chemnitz over the loss of his doctoral degree. He met with the SPD, Thüringen.Gerecht and CDU factions ahead of the Wednesday Landtag session, where the withdrawal was discussed. The Technical University of Chemnitz had withdrawn the title following accusations that his 2008 dissertation on the 2004 U.S. presidential election contained plagiarised material.

Voigt previously appealed the decision without success and had taken the matter to court. While the AfD has called for his removal and lodged a motion to dissolve the parliament and trigger early elections, that motion is unlikely to achieve the required two-thirds majority.