Former Chancellor Merkel, who led Germany and the continent into the Europe Migrant Crisis of 2015 has made a rare break from retirement to play the elder statesman, decrying her successor as party leader for working with the sovereigntist right to vote through border control rules.
Angela Merkel, the former leader of Germany’s Christian Democrats (CDU, globalist centre-right) and longtime Chancellor of Germany came out of retirement on Thursday to pour scorn on her successor for daring break the so-called cordon sanitaire or firewall that all other parties have imposed against the Alternative for Germany (AfD, populist-sovereigntist right) for years.
25 September 2024, Berlin: Angela Merkel (M) accepts the applause from Friedrich Merz (2nd from left), at the Berlin Discussion Special to mark the former Chancellor’s 70th birthday. Photo: Kay Nietfeld/dpa (Photo by Kay Nietfeld/picture alliance via Getty Images)
No party has ever collaborated with the AfD to pass laws in the German Bundestag before, but on Wednesday night the CDU and AfD voted together to pass a border security bill that no other parties would agree to support. CDU leader Friedrich Merz had argued the migration restrictions had clearly been proven essential in the wake of the deadly Magdeburg and Aschaffenburg attacks and among the provisions are those who are ordered to leave Germany should be “immediately taken into custody” and placed into a removal centre.
This is remarkably strident for the centrist CDU, but an election is looming and Merz has been working to rebrand his party and insist it has moved beyond the attitudes of the Angela Merkel open borders era.
Merkel herself appears incensed that her legacy is being dismantled. In a statement published on Thursday, hours after the vote, Merkel began by reminding Merz that he had vowed not to work with the “far right” AfD in 2024. She praised this position as “an expression of great state political responsibility, which I fully support”.
It was “wrong” to move away from this and to allow “the AfD to gain a majority in a vote in the German Bundestag on January 29, 2025 for the first time”, Merkel said. Instead, “all democratic parties” should work together “moderately in tone” to prevent future terror attacks, Merkel said, even though this has been what the German state has been trying for years with questionable success
German newspaper Die Welt notes the CDU leadership has brushed off their old boss coming back to try and micro-manage them, with CDU parliamentary faction leader Thorsten Frei rejecting Merkel’s position without mentioning her by name, and saying: “I think it is right that we put the two motions to the vote yesterday. And I also think it is right that we discuss and decide on the influx limitation law in the German Bundestag tomorrow.”
The world has changed in the past few months and this new reality has to be contended with, Frei said, citing the Magdeburg and Aschaffenburg attacks and the events of November 6th, when Donald Trump won the U.S. Presidential election and the German government collapsed, triggering next month’s snap election.
Unsurprisingly, Germany’s left wing parties were delighted with Merkel’s telling-off, with one Social Democrat (SPD, globalist centre-left) politician calling it an expression of “decency” and that party’s national executive calling the CDU working with the AfD to pass laws a “breach of taboo”.
Party co-leader Saskia Esken said she was “very grateful” for Merkel’s intervention, Welt reported, stating: “She obviously got the impression that she had to remind her successor, Friedrich Merz, of his political responsibility.”
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