Germany narrowly rejects anti-migrant bill

The Bundestag has narrowly rejected a bill to limit migration and close Germany’s borders.

German conservatives caused outrage by relying on the far right to try to push through the bill through parliament.

Centre-left Chancellor Olaf Scholz accused the conservative CDU-CSU alliance, under the leadership of Friedrich Merz (pictured above), of breaking a firewall that has blocked the far right from influence in parliament for nearly 80 years.

“The consensus that democratic parties do not cooperate with the extreme right [has been] broken,” he said after a preliminary non-binding vote on Wednesday passed with support of the far right, Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.

In a rare intervention, former chancellor and CDU party leader, Angela Merkel, berated her successor Friedrich Merz:

“I consider it wrong to abandon this commitment [to freeze out the far right] and, as a result, to knowingly allow a majority with AfD votes in the Bundestag,” she said.

‘Gates to hell’

Social democrat, Rolf Mützenich, made a last attempt to reach out to mainstream conservatives this afternoon:

“It’s not too late. The fall from grace will stay with you forever. But the gates to hell, yes, the gates to hell, we could still close together.”

Merz nonetheless moved ahead, putting legislative proposals to the vote on Friday, hoping to use the momentum and AfD support to pass the “influx limitation” bill.

But this time it failed, with members of the Bundestag voting 338 in favour, 350 against and five abstentions.

The result is a disaster for Friedrich Merz. Despite being well ahead in the polls, he staked his reputation on the bill which he argued was necessary for Germany and not a sop to the far right.

“No-one from my party is extending their hand to the AfD. No one.

“This party is largely a right-wing extremist party. This party is undermining the foundations of our democracy.”

“You surely don’t seriously believe that we are extending our hand to a party that wants to destroy us?”, he said in the debate shortly before the vote.

Under Merkel, the CDU government allowed more than one million, mainly Syrian, asylum seekers to settle in Germany in 2015.

Merz argued that Germany has been left to deal with the “shards of an asylum and immigration policy that has been misguided for ten years”.

Germany has been rocked by a spate of violent attacks in recent years, some of which have been blamed on asylum seekers.

In December, five people were killed and more than 200 injured when a car was driven into a Christmas market. The suspect is originally from Saudi Arabia.

Last week, a man and a toddler were killed in a knife attack in a park in the Bavarian town of Aschaffenburg. Police arrested a 28-year-old man originally from Afghanistan at the scene.

Part of Merz’s solution was to introduce permanent checks at the German border. This would be in breach of the EU’s Schengen border code which allows free movement of people across the European Union.

Up to 30 of his own MPs appear to have rejected his proposals, enough to lose him the vote.

‘Jumped like a tiger’

“What we have seen here is the implosion of a conservative people’s party. Real political change can only happen with the AfD and accordingly we will see how the next three weeks go.

“Friedrich Merz jumped like a tiger and ended up as a doormat,” said AfD leader, Alice Weidel.

German consensus politics means that Merz could yet end up as chancellor, but his reputation, and his influence, have taken a severe knocking.

Suddenly an election which looked like it was all sewn up for the conservatives has been thrown wide open.