Although there isn’t already a new federal in Germany, it’s all but selected that Friedrich Merz of the conservative Christian Democratic Union ( CDU) will be the next president after Sunday’s vote. He may need coalition companions to govern, along with the CDU and its Bavarian sister party, CSU.
How Germany and Europe may deal with US President Donald Trump is one of the large talking points since the results were released.
Merz stated that he wanted to work” to reach freedom from the US” by confirming his group’s success in the election on Sunday night.
This would have been a very uncommon statement for a CDU chief up until recently. In the end, it has always been very fond of the US.
According to Evelyn Gaiser, a policy advisor on intercontinental connections and Nato with the Konrad Adenauer Foundation, a European think tank affiliated with but unrelated to the Christian Democrats, Merz aligns himself with the reputation of historical CDU officials like [former ministers ] Konrad Adenauer and Helmut Kohl, who both played important roles in boosting transatlantic connections.
Friedrich Merz, a devoted transatlanticist,
Merz described himself as” a transatlanticist, a German open to the world, and a European of faith.”
He served as the chairman of the renowned German non-profit organization Atlantik-Brücke ( Atlantic Bridge ), which promotes German-US friendship and understanding, for 10 years, from 2009 to 2019.
According to Rachel Tausendfreund, a senior research fellow with the German Council on Foreign Relations ( DGAP ),” Merz’s party is the most transatlantic in Germany, and he is no exception.” He is also a strong admirer of Nato and pro-European, he says.
Merz also presided over one word for the European Parliament in the first 1990s.
He served in the Bundestag, Germany’s legislature, from 1994 to 2009. He has always been a particular supporter of the US’s liberal economic policies; in 2008, he published a book called” Mehr Kapitalismus wagen” ( which roughly means “venturing more capitalism” ).
Merz claims to have visited the US more than 100 days, and that Ronald Reagan, a former US president, is one of his gods.
No like lost, Merz and Trump
Yet, the US is no longer Merz’s preferred companion under Trump. Germany’s good chancellor-to-be does not like the new US government’s anti-Nato mindset and the Trump administration’s distance from its alleged Russian allies in favor of Russia.
Merz made a statement following JD Vance’s speech at the Munich Security Conference ( MSC ) in February, in which the US vice president claimed that the greatest threat to Europe lay “from within” and did not come from Russia or China.
Merz said on level at the MSC,” This is really the change of an era.” It might be too late for the entire European Union if we don’t notice the wake-up visit right now.
After the European poll results were made public, Trump did not directly welcome Merz on his victory, but did compliment Germany’s” conventional party” in a post on Truth Social.
Trump has doubled down on his assertion that Europeans need to increase their security money so they can take care of their own safety since taking department on January 20. The conclusion is obvious: The US won’t be there for you always.
That’s why even the hazy welcome message the US president exchanged following the CDU get came as a surprise in some ways.
Similarity in domestic legislation and variations on a global scale
Despite the speech, Trump and Merz do share a few things, most notably their strategy to national interests.
According to Tausendfreund, they are both “pro-business liberals and anti-regulation republicans.” Both have used sarcastic speech about left-wing activists and refugees.
Trump and Merz want to stop illegal immigration by strengthening or more closely regulating regional edges, for instance. Merz may have won the German election because of his strict immigration policies and desire to deport asylum seekers from Germany. The far-right AfD, which is renowned for its racist and racist speech, was the second-strongest group.
Immigration has long been one of Trump’s favored subjects, too. He pledged to keep building a wall along the Mexican border in his 2024 battle and attributed the majority of the issues the US faced to immigrants.
In terms of gender-related issues, Merz and Trump both have a traditional outlook. Merz said he could understand what Trump said in a TV debate about the US’s announcement to simply recognize two genders from the start of the new year.
The two gentlemen are, however, a world apart when it comes to international policy. In response to the US turning its attention to Russia, Merz has made it very clear that Germany will continue to support Ukraine and has reiterated that Europe may become strong and united.
The CDU chief said at a press conference on Monday that “what we even see with the greatest problem, of course, is the attempt ] by Trump to make a deal with Russia over the minds of the Europeans, over the minds of Ukraine. When I declare that this is intolerable both for Ukraine and Europe, it won’t come as a surprise to you.
Trump once vowed to never support Nato nations that had not provided their” good share” of defense funding in the event of a Russian attack.
He had to withdraw from this risk, but he no longer appears to see Moscow as a risk. He most recently announced that he would meet with Vladimir Putin, his Russian counterpart, to talk about the continuing conflict in Ukraine.
Does Merz defeat Trump in a fight with Europe’s core?
Germany will probably try to form a powerful inner-European partnership once it has been established to make up for US opposition.
A CDU-led government should take on a more significant status within the European Union, according to Gaiser of the Konrad Adenauer Foundation. Friedrich Merz, the chancellor, stated that his top priority will be to” strategically strengthen Europe— whose financial power he generally emphasizes — and to increase its independence as a global actor.”
Under Trump, Tausendfreund of the DGAP believes Merz will want to intensify cooperation between Europe in areas of surveillance and Ukraine, sending a clear message that the globe can go it alone. Since he has never led a European city, state, or nation as a whole, she said it would be exciting to see how he fared.
We don’t know how up to the challenge Merz is, according to Tausendfreund, because he is “almost completely unknown as a political head.” He does appear to be aware of and sensitive to the bets, he says.
