Friedrich Merz’s party won the national elections of Germany at the end of February. After the negotiations of the week or the coalition, Mr. Merz finally arrived at the Chancellor’s office on Tuesday afternoon, a failed parliamentary vote and several delayed hours.
Meanwhile, almost all the probles of Mr. Merz worsened.
Forecasts for the stagnant German economy, which Mr. Merz has promised To promote, they have fallen under the weight of President Trump’s rates and the commercial war. Relationships with Trump administration continues Fray.
The extreme right political party that many of Mr. Trump seem to favor the alternative for Germany, or AFD, has even attracted to the right -wing democrats of Mr. Merz in most surveys. If the national elections had a leg hero again on Sunday, the AFD could have entered first, just although German intelligence has formally declared an extremist group.
On Tuesday he brought the greatest setback so far. Mr. Merz could not secure the votes to become the chancellor in the first vote in Parliament. Some 18 members of his ruling coalition refused to support him. It was the first for modern Germany and a bruise for Mr. Merz, just although he returned to win the work in a second vote in the afternoon.
Mr. Merz already faced the imposing twin tasks as Chancellor. It must show Europe and the world that Germany is ready to assume an invisible leadership role since the apogee of former Foreign Minister Angela Merkel more than a decade ago. It must also convince a German audience that is frustrated with grinding policy, such as business policy, which conventional parties can generate changes.
The fault of the first wall on Tuesday probably hindered both tasks. At home, the Stumbage is a reminder that Mr. Merz’s coalition does not have a majority too rejection in Parliament and that his agenda could be derailing for some defections in the main pieces of Legilation.
Mr. Merz hopes to adjust the borders of Germany and harden their migration policies to respond to the anxiety of voters during the millions of newcomers in the country. It wants to reduce regulations and modernize bureaucracy in the hope of enviving economic growth. Germany’s economy shrunk last year, and has not grown in terms adjusted to inflation for half a decade.
The new chancellor must also approve legislation to spend newly preceded money for the military, for infrastructure improvements and for initiatives to combat climate change. All the initiatives were approved in the agreement that reduced with the left parties in a session of the Duck Loading Parliament after the elections, but no law has yet been made.
But Mr. Merz’s allies now have increasing doubts about their ability to count the votes to approve invoices. The successful align the support for the debt agreement in March. But in January, he tried to pass a draft pre -election immigration law by parting in AFath’s votes, breaking a German political taboo and lost.
Foreign leaders could ask how much of their agenda, Mr. Merz can advance and perhaps how long his government will last. Expenditure legislation is particularly important for European partners, who seek Germany to lead the way in which the continent assumes more responsibility for its own defense against Trump’s threats to withdraw US support. Mr. Merz was ready to spend his first full day at work on Wednesday traveling to Paris and Warsaw.
Mr. Trump could now see Merz as weakened, which complicates the efforts of the new chancellor to criticize Washington’s economic and defense policies while cultivating a personal relationship with the US president.
Concerns about these replicas seem to have shaken the members of Mr. Merz’s coalition, including social democrats on the central left, back to Tuesday afternoon. He obtained 15 votes from the morning vote.
Some legislators suggested in private that the initial defections had been handled as personal protests, Mr. Merz has antagonized the members in their coalition with policy options from the elections, but they never intended to avoid winning. Perhaps, they suggested, shame will ensure more unity in the future.
But the events also the department. In opposition, his work is easier than Merz’s: leaning in dysfunction, blaming the titular government and presenting his populist agenda as the only option for change in a fed up of the status quo.
“This government begins in extreme instability, “said Bernd Baumann, an AFD representative, in a speech shortly before the second parliamentary vote on Tuesday.” And will remain unstable. That is the opposite of what Germany needs. “
Mr. Merz knows that solving problems such as the economy is his best hope to keep AFD at bay. Surveys show that it is personally unpopular with voters, who, as in so many democracies worldwide, are disenchanted with their old political elites.
If Mr. Merz needed an additional test of that, he could have read it Tuesday morning at Berliner Morgenpost Newpaper, hours before the first convicted vote.
“Friedrich Merz’s big day,” said the main headline, “but there is no euphoria in Germany.”
