{"id":78087,"date":"2025-05-06T03:17:16","date_gmt":"2025-05-06T03:17:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/78087\/"},"modified":"2025-05-06T03:17:16","modified_gmt":"2025-05-06T03:17:16","slug":"trump-has-already-screwed-over-germanys-new-chancellor-politico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/78087\/","title":{"rendered":"Trump has already screwed over Germany\u2019s new chancellor \u2013 POLITICO"},"content":{"rendered":"

After Germany\u2019s federal domestic intelligence agency classified the AfD last week as a \u201cproven\u201d extremist organization<\/a> \u2014\u00a0a designation that is fueling a long-simmering domestic debate<\/a> on whether to ban the AfD under German law provisions intended to prevent a repeat of the Nazi past \u2014 the party received backing from the highest ranking members of Trump\u2019s cabinet.<\/p>\n

The extremist label was \u201ctyranny in disguise,\u201d U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a post on X<\/a>. \u201cWhat is truly extremist is not the popular AfD, but rather the establishment\u2019s deadly open border immigration policies that the AfD opposes.\u201d U.S. Vice President JD Vance\u00a0echoed the sentiment, saying \u201cthe German establishment\u201d was effectively rebuilding the Berlin Wall.<\/p>\n

Merz \u2015 of the center right Christian Democrats (CDU) \u2015 is part of the German establishment that Rubio and Vance were disparaging. Despite vowing to lead a severe crackdown on migration, Merz has refused to govern in coalition with the anti-immigration AfD, which came in second place in the February election, the best result for the far right in Germany\u2019s postwar history, deeming the party to be too extreme. Instead he opted for the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), which scored its worst result in a national election\u00a0since\u00a0the 19th century.<\/p>\n

This puts Merz in a uniquely risky political position. As the far right rises, he finds himself presiding over a coalition of crumbling mainstream parties that once dominated Germany\u2019s political landscape.<\/p>\n

Centrist governments comprising the SPD and Merz\u2019s conservative bloc have long been referred to as \u201cgrand coalitions\u201d for their sweeping majorities. But there\u2019s nothing imposing about the current \u201cgrand coalition,\u201d which is the weakest such partnership in history and leaves Merz open to accusations he\u2019s leading a remnant of a vanishing order.<\/p>\n

The rise of the AfD<\/p>\n

In this position, Merz is particularly vulnerable to attacks from the AfD, which will be the largest opposition party in the parliament. AfD leaders incessantly depict Merz as a closet leftist because of his refusal to govern with them and due to his embrace of debt-fueled spending<\/a> after his election victory, a complete reversal from his campaign rhetoric.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"After Germany\u2019s federal domestic intelligence agency classified the AfD last week as a \u201cproven\u201d extremist organization \u2014\u00a0a designation…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":78088,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5310],"tags":[32410,768,473,32,33,2000,299,7058,12336,1214,1105,36,1945,1824,2348,40,2817,601,660,2820,6657,2597,5111,770,46,479,1201,657,49,771],"class_list":{"0":"post-78087","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-germany","8":"tag-alice-weidel","9":"tag-borders","10":"tag-defense","11":"tag-donald-trump","12":"tag-elections","13":"tag-eu","14":"tag-europe","15":"tag-european-defense","16":"tag-european-defense-policy","17":"tag-exports","18":"tag-far-right","19":"tag-france","20":"tag-friedrich-merz","21":"tag-germany","22":"tag-history","23":"tag-immigration","24":"tag-intelligence","25":"tag-jd-vance","26":"tag-kremlin","27":"tag-marco-rubio","28":"tag-migration","29":"tag-military","30":"tag-parliament","31":"tag-poland","32":"tag-policy","33":"tag-tariffs","34":"tag-trade","35":"tag-ukraine","36":"tag-united-states","37":"tag-war"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114458725164761350","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78087","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=78087"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/78087\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/78088"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=78087"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=78087"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=78087"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}