The German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, has sacked his finance minister Christian Lindner escalating a long conflict in the German government and ultimately causing the fragile coalition between Social Democrats, Greens, and the Free Democratic Party to collapse. For once, Scholz, often mocked as a robotic speaker without emotion, appeared to be angry – even resentful.
In a speech, Scholz blamed Lindner for the government’s collapse, and portrayed his former finance minister as petty, uncompromising and untrustworthy. Linder’s response was swift and equally bitter. He accused the chancellor of a lack of ambition and poor leadership.
The vice-chancellor and economy minister, Robert Habeck, admitted that ministers had been consistently arguing since 2021. But he added that he felt that the government collapse was avoidable and unnecessary.
Habeck is expected to run for chancellor, though he and his Green party are in the most difficult position of all coalition parties. They are in deep crisis, and the polls show that. In a recent poll, the Greens received the lowest popularity score since 2017.
But Habeck is clearly worried about more than his own party. He issued a stark warning to those who put their hopes in a snap election. In Germany’s increasingly fragmented political landscape, forming governments on a local and national level will only get harder.
What next?
For the time being, Scholz will remain chancellor and most ministers will stay in their jobs. But having lost one of the junior partners in the coalition he no longer has a majority in the German Bundestag. This makes his government a toothless tiger, unable to pass laws or to make important decisions.
Scholz knows this and has announced a vote of confidence in the Bundestag for January 15. If he loses that vote, Scholz could then ask president Frank-Walter Steinmeier for early elections
If Scholz’s plan succeeds, the next federal elections in Germany would take place in late March – six months earlier than planned. But the Conservative opposition leader, Friedrich Merz, has already made it known that he doesn’t want to wait that long.
He has called for Scholz to trigger new elections immediately. Merz knows that Scholz’s days as chancellor are numbered, and that he has a good chance of replacing him.
A Trump supporter as German chancellor?
Right now, Merz has every reason to be confident. In September 2024, he was unanimously elected as Conservative candidate for the chancellorship. This means that Merz can count of the support of two parties: the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU), which was last in power under Angela Merkel, and the Christian Social Union (CSU) in Bavaria.
In sharp contrast to his predecessor Merkel, Merz has made it his mission to close Germany’s borders to asylum seekers – even if that would mean breaking international agreements. He polemically questions the relevance of traditional media and uses his X account to rail against criminal immigrants and gender-inclusive language. Like the newly reelected US president Donald Trump, Merz rejects environmentalism and is a firm believer in capitalism.
“We would get along” said Merz when asked about his feelings towards Trump. But there are some differences. For example, Merz has repeatedly stressed his unreserved support for Volodymyr Zelensky’s forces and has pledged to provide more weapons and money for Ukraine.
As a trained lawyer, Merz was deeply critical of Trump’s response to his election defeat in 2020. Then, Merz wrote on twitter: “Donald Trump is clearly no democrat. He refuses to accept his defeat or the decisions of the courts”.
In 2024, things are different. Merz is embracing a second Trump presidency. Perhaps not enthusiastically, but certainly with a lot of pragmatism and some hope for the future. Even if he is less vocal about it than Hungary’s Viktor Orbán, Merz’s vision is to “Make Europe Great Again”.