If Merz or any other candidate had failed to secure a majority within those 14 days, the constitution allows for the president to appoint the candidate who wins the most votes as chancellor, or to dissolve the Bundestag and hold a new national election.
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Merz’s biographer, Volker Resing, said that if Merz won in the second round, everything will be fine and people may soon forget about the first-round hiccup.
Alice Weidel, co-leader of the far-right, anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany party, slammed Merz’s failure as proof that his coalition has a “weak foundation” and called for fresh elections.
AfD is the biggest opposition party in Germany’s new parliament after it placed second in February’s elections. Despite its historic gains, it was shut out of coalition talks due to the so-called “firewall” that mainstream German political parties have upheld against cooperating with far-right parties since the end of the war.
80th anniversary of World War II
Tuesday’s voting came on the eve of the 80th anniversary of Nazi Germany’s unconditional surrender in World War II. The ballots are cast in the restored Reichstag building, where graffiti left by victorious Soviet troops has been preserved at several locations.
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The shadow of the war in Ukraine also loomed over Tuesday’s vote. Germany is the second-biggest supplier of military aid to Ukraine, after the United States.
Overall, Germany is the fourth-largest defence spender in the world, according to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, which studies trends in global military expenditures. Only the US, China and Russia are ahead.
Germany rose to that rank thanks to an investment of 100 billion euros ($175 billion) for its armed forces, a measure passed by lawmakers in 2022.
Defence spending rose again earlier this year, when parliament loosened the nation’s strict debt rules. It’s a move that’s been closely watched by the rest of Europe as the Trump administration has threatened to pull back from its security support on the continent.
Besides ramping up defence spending, Merz’s coalition has pledged to spur economic growth, take a tougher approach to migration and catch up on long-neglected modernisation.
Germany and the Trump administration
The US administration has bashed Germany repeatedly since President Donald Trump’s inauguration in January. Trump, who has German roots, often expressed his dislike of former Chancellor Angela Merkel during his first term in office.
This time around, Trump’s lieutenants are at the forefront – tech billionaire and Trump ally Elon Musk has supported AfD for months. He hosted a chat with Weidel that he livestreamed on X earlier this year to amplify her party’s message.
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Vice President JD Vance, during the Munich Security Conference in February, assailed the “firewall” and later met with Weidel, a move that German officials heavily criticised.
Last week, the German domestic intelligence service said it has classified AfD as a “right-wing extremist” organisation, making it subject to greater and broader surveillance.
The decision by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution prompted blowback from US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Vance over the weekend. Germany’s Foreign Ministry hit back at Rubio after he called on the country to drop the classification.
The domestic intelligence service’s measure does not amount to a ban of the party, which can only take place through a request by either of parliament’s two chambers or the federal government through the Federal Constitutional Court.
Merz has not commented publicly on the intelligence service’s decision.
AP
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