German Parliament Clears Path for Early Election
(Bloomberg) -- German lawmakers passed a measure that will pave the way for a national election in two months, backing Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s plan to end his embattled administration early.
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The Social Democrat called the confidence vote after he fired Finance Minister Christian Lindner, head of the Free Democrats, which meant he lost his majority in the lower house of parliament. The maneuver sets the stage for an election on Feb. 23, seven months earlier than scheduled.
The three-way ruling alliance — which also includes the Greens — collapsed in early November after months of infighting. Lindner and the FDP were reluctant to allow more borrowing to support Ukraine and bolster Germany’s sputtering economy, with both sides accusing the other of a breach of trust.
The political uncertainty comes at a delicate time for Europe’s largest economy, which has stagnated for years. In addition to long-festering competitive issues, Donald Trump’s return to the White House threatens to intensify pressure on Germany by raising questions over US support for Ukraine and imposing new tariffs that could hit the country’s exporters.
The next chancellor will also need to secure funds and public support for massive investments needed to upgrade crumbling infrastructure, shore up defense capabilities and shift to a more technologically advanced and climate-friendly economy. Alongside reviving growth, government borrowing as well as irregular migration will be key election topics.
In the Bundestag, a majority of 394 lawmakers backed a no-confidence measure. Scholz can now ask President Frank-Walter Steinmeier to dissolve the parliament and formally set the election date. The fellow Social Democrat has indicated that he’ll go along with Scholz’s timetable.
In his push for re-election, Scholz called for massive new spending on infrastructure and defense. “It’s high time to invest forcefully into our country,” he told lawmakers ahead of the vote. “We must turn the switch and this means now.”
So far there have only been two cases in which German chancellors have used this parliamentary instrument with the aim of losing a confidence vote in order to bring about new elections: Former CDU Chancellor Helmut Kohl did it in 1982 and his SPD successor Gerhard Schroeder in 2005. Kohl won, while Schroeder lost.
With campaigning just getting underway, the conservative CDU/CSU alliance under Friedrich Merz leads with support at around 31%, the far-right Alternative for Germany — or AfD — is second with 19.8% and the SPD third at 17%, according to the latest Bloomberg polling average.
In the parliamentary debate, Merz lashed out at Scholz, saying “you are leaving the country in one of the biggest economic crises of the post-war period.”
The Greens are fourth with 11.2% and the BSW — a new far-left party founded in January — fifth at 7.5%. Lindner’s FDP remains in danger of missing the 5% threshold for getting into parliament with 4.9%.
The conservatives have ruled out cooperating with the AfD, meaning their only path to a Bundestag majority will likely be to team up with either the SPD or the Greens, or both.
The Greens have named Robert Habeck, the current economy minister and vice chancellor, as their lead candidate for the election, while the AfD picked co-leader Alice Weidel.
“While we in Central Europe are largely preoccupied with ourselves, the world is not standing still,” Habeck said. “It is not a good state of affairs.”
--With assistance from Arne Delfs and Kamil Kowalcze.
(Corrects parliament president’s name in caption of video in story originally published Dec. 16.)
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