Dispute over "Germany First": Greens and SPD against Merz, but Scholz agrees with Trump

Berliner Zeitung Dispute over "Germany First": Greens and SPD against Merz, but Scholz agrees with Trump Article by Len Sander • 1 hour • 2 minutes reading time Wants to emphasize Germany's interests more strongly again: CDU chairman Friedrich Merz in Berlin last week. While the United States is reorganizing itself after the election of Donald Trump, German politics is in a state of disintegration. The election campaign has long since begun, the dispute over when Chancellor Scholz will ask the question of confidence and when new elections can be held continues. In this context, members of the outgoing government are now turning against CDU chairman Friedrich Merz. After an interview he gave in Stern, there are increasing voices from the SPD and the Greens who accuse him of a certain sympathy with Trump. In the interview on Sunday, Merz said, among other things, that he wanted to represent Germany's interests more strongly. Germany should go from "a sleeping middle power to a leading middle power again". By focusing on one's own interests, it is possible to reach bilateral agreements from which both sides benefit: "Trump would call it a deal," said Merz. Merz accused the outgoing federal government of positioning itself in favor of Democrat Kamala Harris and thus damaging Germany's foreign policy concerns. Scholz is now a "lame duck" internationally. He himself wants to confront Trump with "uprightness and clarity." These statements caused controversy on Sunday. Franziska Brantner, parliamentary state secretary to Economics Minister Robert Habeck (both Greens), accused Merz on Sunday on X of wanting to "make deals directly with Trump alone." In the interview, he said "not a word about Europe. Germany First." Brantner went on to write: "We are also continuing on a national path in terms of security policy." Brantner is running for the party chairmanship at the Green Party conference next weekend, together with Felix Banaszak. The fact that Franziska Brantner uses the phrase "Germany First" to refer to Merz is an allusion to Donald Trump's foreign policy doctrine of "America First", which has isolationist and nationalist overtones. For Trump, it is primarily about representing American interests. Accordingly, Brantner's post suggests a comparison between Trump and Merz. When asked by the Berliner Zeitung, her office made it clear "that she is not doing that". Merz was also sharply attacked by members of the SPD for the statements in his interview. Dirk Wiese, the spokesman for the Seeheimer Circle, wrote on Sunday that Merz wanted "deals with Trump. That smacks of rotten compromises". The accompanying X article states, "Merz makes America great again". This was the central slogan of his first presidential candidacy in 2016. In contrast, what is needed is a "straight back, a clear stance and a strong compass of one's own. Olaf Scholz proves this", said SPD Bundestag member Wiese. After the first telephone conversation between Chancellor Scholz and the future President of the United States on Sunday evening, the government spokesman announced that Scholz and Trump had "agreed" to work towards a "return of peace in Europe". The "successful cooperation between the governments of both countries for decades" should be continued, said the spokesman. As recently as 2022, the SPD party leader, Lars Klingbeil, compared Markus Söder and Friedrich Merz directly with Donald Trump in the dispute over the citizen's allowance: "Anyone who behaves like this, who follows Donald Trump's path of spreading fake news, who thinks that the country must be divided, has no place in the political center of this country."