German Conservatives Step Up Anti-Immigration Push With New Bill
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German Conservatives Step Up Anti-Immigration Push With New Bill
Iain Rogers
4 min read
(Bloomberg) -- German conservative leader Friedrich Merz is stepping up his hard-line immigration push despite a growing backlash over his move earlier this week to force a resolution through parliament with backing from the far right.
Bundestag lawmakers are due on Friday to vote on a bill Merz and his CDU/CSU bloc say is designed to cut the number of immigrants arriving in Europe’s biggest economy. To secure a majority, he’ll again need to rely on support from the Alternative for Germany, even if he insists he’s not actively cooperating with the anti-immigrant party.
A fierce debate around irregular migration and its impact on domestic security has dominated the campaign for Germany’s snap election on Feb. 23, in which Merz remains the clear frontrunner, with the AfD in second place.
What’s happening today?
Lawmakers in the Bundestag, the lower house of parliament in Berlin, will begin debating the CDU/CSU bill — dubbed the “influx-limiting law” — at 10.30 a.m. local time, and Merz is expected to lobby for support with a statement to the chamber.
The debate will last for around 70 minutes, followed by a roll-call vote. The result should be known roughly half an hour after that.
Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrats and the Greens, who are ruling in a minority government after Scholz expelled the Free Democrats from his three-party coalition in November, have denounced the bill as unconstitutional and say it contravenes European law.
What’s in the bill?
Broadly speaking, it includes measures designed to reduce irregular immigration from countries outside the European Union and cut the number of family members following asylum seekers to Germany, and would give federal police enhanced powers to carry out deportations.
Is it likely to get approved?
As things stand, the law is likely to get enough votes from the CDU/CSU, the AfD, the Free Democrats, the far-left BSW party and some independents to pass.
Scholz’s SPD, the Greens and the Left Party are all expected to reject the bill but that likely won’t be enough to block it. Merz’s non-binding migration resolution — which unlike Friday’s bill the government is free to ignore — passed on Wednesday by 348 votes to 344, with 10 abstentions.
What happens next?
Merz is going ahead with Friday’s vote even though he knows the bill will almost probably be killed in the Bundesrat, the upper house of parliament where the 16 federal states are represented.
Kai Wegner, the CDU mayor of Berlin, said Thursday he would “never approve a law in the Bundesrat that was only passed depending on the votes of the AfD.”
What is Merz up to then?
Merz’s strategy is a calculated gambit to try to neutralize the AfD and deliver a breakthrough with wavering voters, according to people familiar with his thinking.
He’s justified his moves in parliament by saying that last week’s fatal knife attack in Bavaria — in which the suspected perpetrator is a 28-year-old Afghan man whose asylum request had been rejected — proved radical action is needed.
He argues that he can’t be prevented from taking action to improve domestic security just because the AfD will back his plans.
What has the reaction been?
Critics say that by accepting AfD backing in parliament, even if he didn’t actively seek it out, Merz broke a taboo in German postwar politics and compromised a firewall erected by mainstream parties designed to keep the far right away from power.
Scholz said Wednesday during a fractious Bundestag session that “there are limits one must not cross as a statesman” and accused Merz of populism.
Former Chancellor Angela Merkel, a member of Merz’s Christian Democratic Union, unexpectedly weighed in on Thursday with an open letter saying Merz’s strategy is wrong. Thousands of people protested against Merz’s strategy at the CDU’s Berlin headquarters on Thursday, along with thousands more in other German cities like Munich, Leipzig and Kiel.
What’s the likely fallout?
The bad blood that has been generated between Merz’s CDU/CSU on one side and Scholz’s SPD and the Greens on the other will make negotiations on forming a coalition government after the election harder.
If he wins as expected, Merz’s alliance options could be limited to those two parties as it’s possible the Free Democrats, the BSW and the Left will all miss the 5% threshold for getting into parliament.
What are the polls saying?
There’s been little movement in surveys of voter intention in recent weeks, with the CDU/CSU still leading by around 10 percentage points on average.
An Insa poll for Bild newspaper published Thursday showed support for Merz’s conservative bloc at 29%, down one point from the previous week, and the AfD stable on 22% in second place. The SPD gained 1.5 points to 17% and the Greens were up half a point at 13%.
--With assistance from Michael Nienaber and Arne Delfs.
