Later this month Germany faces a crucial test. After the last election in 2021 a three-party ‘traffic light’ coalition of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Greens and the Free Democratic Party (FDP) was formed. However, cracks gradually began to appear in the façade; they ultimately turned into a San Andreas fault which culminated in FDP leader Christian Lindner being dismissed from the government by Chancellor Olaf Scholz on 6 November 2024.
On 15 November, Die Zeit and Süddeutsche Zeitung independently reported that the FDP had been planning a strategy to break the coalition for several weeks. The two newspapers reported on the existence of a detailed 18-page working paper which described the upcoming election campaign as ‘open battle’. FDP leader Christian Lindner bizarrely denied any knowledge of the paper. But this tension triggered the collapse of the coalition, leaving the government without a majority. Scholz went to see the president to resign and 23 February 2025 was then set as the date for the snap election.
A cunning plan
In recent months there have been several acts of violence in German cities allegedly caused by Islamic or immigrant extremists. Just before Christmas a Saudi doctor with reported far-right, anti-Muslim sympathies was arrested after a car-ramming rampage at a Christmas market in the eastern city of Magdeburg in which six people were killed and about 200 injured. And in mid-January a 28-year-old Afghan man was arrested after a knife attack in a park in Aschaffenburg that killed two people, including a toddler. Olaf Scholz condemned the rampage as an “inexplicable act of terror” that required “immediate consequences. He said, “It’s not enough just to talk … I am sick of such acts of violence occurring every few weeks by attackers who came to us seeking protection. Misplaced tolerance is completely inappropriate”.
Friedrich Merz, leader of the centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU), was deeply shocked by the violence, saying in a statement that ‘This can’t go on’. He published a five-point-plan aimed at radical change in the country’s migration policy: permanent border controls and a de facto entry ban for individuals who do not have valid entry documents, regardless of whether or not they request asylum.
There is nothing groundbreaking about this plan but, realistically, it won’t be implemented anyway because it violates European law and depends on the co-operation of European partners, who have already announced that they won’t co-operate. Essentially, the plan is an empty rallying call to mobilise voters around a non-issue at a time when Germany’s economy is performing badly.
Alice Weidel, co-leader of the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), and currently second in the polls, posted on X, ‘”Remigration now!” referring to her party’s highly controversial call for mass deportation of migrants and asylum seekers.
The Brandmauer (firewall)
Merz announced that he was willing to accept votes from the AfD to implement the five-point-plan, saying that he would no longer be swayed from what he believes is right, just because the wrong people also believe it is right.
How should we view this claim? Is it the view of a decent politician with backbone who won’t let the far-right distract him from ‘doing the right thing’? No, it is an assault on the Brandmauer: the long-standing convention in Germany that the mainstream parties will exclude the far-right parties from government. The firewall was last put to the test after Landtag elections in Brandenburg, Saxony and Thuringia last year, when the AfD achieved the far right’s best results since the war. In each case, however, the mainstream parties were able to exclude them from government.
On Friday, 31 January (‘crunchtime-Freitag’ as they say in Neudeutsch) Merz attempted to gain parliamentary support for his restrictive immigration law. Despite the support of the AfD it narrowly failed in the Bundestag after 12 CDU members either voted against or abstained. The FDP were divided: two voted against, five abstained and 16 failed to turn up, although the parliamentary group had recommended a vote in favour and 67 MPs followed the party line.
All the AfD group voted in favour as did seven members of the Putin-loving Bündnis Sarah Wagenknecht (BSW). The SPD, Greens and die Linke voted en bloc against the bill. It’s a major embarrassment for Merz, who had defended his tactics throughout the week in the face of a fierce backlash, and also criticism from former CDU chancellor Angela Merkel, although it is feared her intervention will end up doing the very thing she warned against: boosting support for the AfD.
American interference
Trump’s anointed heir, Elon Musk, has thrown his weight behind the AfD, recently interviewing Alice Weidel on X (and repeatedly mispronouncing her name as ‘Wheedle’). He sparked outrage by telling AfD supporters just two days before the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz that it was time for Germany to “move on from past guilt”, thereby lending support to the party’s long-standing effort to challenge the fundamental ideas behind Germany’s Erinnerungskultur (‘culture of remembrance’).
What’s new is that this message is now coming from near the pinnacle of American power, with Musk offering support for some of the most taboo stances in German politics. This will have gone down well with one AfD candidate, Matthias Helferich, who has described himself in leaked chats as the ‘friendly face of National Socialism’. Scholz, who joined world leaders at Auschwitz to mark the 80th anniversary of the liberation of the death camp, struck an unusually emotional and deadly accurate tone in his speech, calling Musk’s intervention “disgusting”.
Now what?
A government led by the CDU/CSU is seen as most likely, given its large polling lead. But a coalition will be inevitable. Merz has shown willingness to discuss a coalition with the SPD, FDP as well as the Greens; however, Markus Söder, leader of the CSU, the CDU’s partner in Bavaria, has openly refused to enter a government with the Greens. A fifth grand coalition in Germany’s history between the CDU and SPD is thus seen as the most realistic possibility. Söder has stipulated, however, that he would only support such a coalition if Scholz is not included in the next cabinet.
FDP leader Lindner has indicated his desire to form a government with the CDU/CSU but Merz has stated that only if the FDP’s polling figures increased to six or seven percent would a stable majority be in reach. Whether two parties are sufficient for a majority coalition may depend on the number of parties entering the Bundestag. While the SPD, CDU/CSU, Greens, and the AfD are all polling well above the 5% threshold, the fate of the FDP, The Left, BSW, and the Free Voters are uncertain. This means that the number of parties in the Bundestag could be as few as four or reach as many as eight, making the exact seat distribution harder to predict beforehand.
Sonntagsfrage (The Sunday question)
It remains to be seen whether the AfD’s support for the Merz plan will substantially improve the party’s standing. But after this week’s gambit, Merz will confront the essential question facing conservative parties across Europe: does shifting sharply right on migration help neutralise the rising far right, or further fuel its rise? Recent evidence seems to suggest that when presented with the copy (a conservative party shifting right) and the ‘original’ (the far right), voters tended to prefer the ‘original’.
Merz is clearly hoping his new ‘tough-on-migration’ stance will help win back conservatives who have defected to the AfD. The pollsters seem in agreement that focusing on immigration has not helped Merz, but that focusing on the economy would.
Political commentators are waiting to see the results of the latest Sonntagsfrage when pollsters ask ‘If there were an election on Sunday who would you vote for?’ A poll taken on ‘crunchtime-Freitag’ showed the CDU on 28% and the AfD on 20%. A poll on 8 February showed the CDU on 29% and the AfD on 21%. So, not a dramatic increase in support for the far right but it means the AfD will be the main opposition party and this has a huge symbolic significance. However, it’s two weeks to go to the election and late arrivals at the pollsters’ ball are still expected.
The Bürgerschaft (Landtag) of Hamburg is up for re-election on 2 March. It will be interesting to see how the AfD performs in what is an SPD stronghold (2020: SPD 39.2%, AfD 5.3%).
A lesson to be learnt
Kemi Badenoch is on record as saying that the Conservatives will refrain from any new policy announcements until next year. Not a clever move. It opens up the field to Reform to come out with increasingly fascistic policies which the Tories will seek to ape. Meanwhile, some elements in the Labour party are also seeking to ‘out-Reform’ Reform. This, too, is a politically suicidal move. With the UK electoral system it is, of course, irrelevant how many votes you win. What counts is where you win them. Recent opinion polls and MRP analysis have shown Reform in first place.
Before coming to power, Hitler was fond of the expression ‘five minutes to midnight’, meaning the end of the Weimar Republic. This is a fair comment on both Britain and Germany today. In a Trumpian-Muskovite world, it is absolutely essential to squeeze out the extreme right wing and stand up for decent liberal (small ‘l’) values.
Editor’s Note: For other West England Bylines articles on the upcoming German election, see Helmut Hubel’s recent piece
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