Thread by @jonworth

2021 is the end of Angela Merkel's time as Chancellor of 🇩🇪

The process to choose her successor starts this week

This 🧵 will explain all the important stages of this rather complex process!

1/25

There are three stages to this:
1️⃣ Merkel's CDU Party choses a new Party Leader on 16 Jan (tag: #CDUVorsitz)
2️⃣ Later in spring Members of the Bundestag of CDU and CSU choose who will be Chancellor Candidate
3️⃣ Bundestag Election 26 Sep, followed by coalition negotiations

2/25

1️⃣ CDU choses new Party Leader

Merkel has not been CDU party leader since 2018. Current leader - Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer - is stopping. 1001 Delegates at a party conference taking place digitally 15-16 Jan choose new Leader, in 2 rounds of voting. 3 candidates running

3/25

--- Friedrich Merz ---
65, from Nordrhein-Westfalen, previously Member of the Bundestag, then lawyer, now on the comeback trail

Politically to the right of Merkel, pro-business

Style: always wants to be the smartest in the room, comes across as arrogant, can make gaffes

4/25

--- Armin Laschet ---
59, currently Prime Minister of Nordrhein-Westfalen, previously Member of Bundestag & Member of European Parliament

Politically similar to Merkel, ideologically flexible

Style: more like a mayor of a small town than a national politician, folksy

5/25

--- Norbert Röttgen ---
55, from Nordrhein-Westfalen, Chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the Bundestag, previously Environment Minister

Politically similar to Merkel, more forthright on foreign policy

Style: serious and professional, but not unfriendly

6/25

So what is going to happen?

Merz likely to win the first round of voting. The candidate who's 3rd in the first round of voting is eliminated (likely Laschet or Röttgen), and more of their votes will go to whichever of Röttgen or Laschet is still in the running in 2nd round

7/25

Note: we really do not know who will win. Röttgen himself has stated that this is an "offenes Rennen" (an open race) and he is right. All we know is Merz has a solid base of support, but vote transfers Laschet↔️Röttgen might still see Merz lose

8/25

So 16 Jan the CDU has a new party leader. What next?

Stage 2️⃣ is making this person the Chancellor Candidate (or not) - we do not know when exactly this will happen - but it will be sometime in the spring

9/25

Before that happens there are two important regional (Land) elections on 14 March - in Baden-Württemberg and Rheinland-Pfalz (neither has a CDU Prime Minister currently). How the CDU does in these elections will help show whether the new party leader is succeeding or not

10/25

Here another party enters the picture... the CDU's Bavarian sister party, the CSU. The CSU runs candidates for the Bundestag in Bavaria, the CDU in the other 15 regions (Länder), but they *together* put forward a Chancellor Candidate. The CSU's Stoiber was chosen in 2002

11/25

The choice of Chancellor Candidate is a vote of CDU and CSU Members of the Bundestag (MdBs). They could go for the CDU Party Leader (Merz, Laschet, Röttgen), or they could go for someone else... such as CSU Party Leader Söder, or even another CDU politician Spahn

12/25

--- Markus Söder ---
54, from Nürnberg, protestant (Bavaria is mostly catholic, and all others in the running are catholic), Party Leader of the CSU

Politically used to be a hardliner, softening recently

Style: a real political professional, smooth but not inhuman

13/25

--- Jens Spahn ---
40, CDU, from Nordrhein-Westfalen, now Health Minister, Germany's most prominent gay politician

Politically somewhere between Laschet and Merz

Style: professional but can be abrasive

Could step up if Merz/Laschet/Röttgen were to stumble, alt. to Söder

14/25

So - in short - the winner of stage 1️⃣ (to be CDU Party Leader) has a good chance in stage 2️⃣ (to be Chancellor Candidate), but it is not a foregone conclusion - Söder or Spahn could step up *if* Merz/Laschet/Röttgen are struggling by the spring

15/25

That brings us to stage 3️⃣ - the Bundestag election 26 Sep

That the total number of seats for CDU-CSU is larger than that for any other party is pretty certain. But the CDU-CSU will not be able to govern alone... they will need coalition partners

16/25

Traditionally CDU-CSU has aimed to make coalition governments with FDP (economic liberals) but FDP has struggled since 2017, and might only just get into the Bundestag in 2021 (there is a 5% of the vote hurdle to get any seats), and CDU-CSU+FDP probably ≠ a majority

17/25

Most likely coalition is CDU-CSU+Greens, but the Greens would have problems with Merz (and poss. somewhat with Söder, Spahn) as Chancellor Candidate. Laschet or Röttgen would be easier

So if the CDU goes for Merz, and he becomes Chancellor Candidate... then coalition 🤕

18/25

There is also the fear that Merz would appeal to FDP and even AfD (populist right) voters, but would lose pragmatic centrist voters to the Greens and SPD (Social Democrats), opening up the chance of a Green-Red-Red coalition (Greens, SPD, Die Linke (Left Party))

19/25

The danger for the CDU of going for Laschet, Röttgen or Spahn is they would try to hold Merkel's voter coalition together, but as none of them has her level of political skill, things could go badly in the polls quite quickly

20/25

And meanwhile Söder is not a perfect solution either - many in the CDU think that someone from the CSU could never win an election (they remember Stoiber and earlier Franz Josef Strauß), although Söder arguably has more mainstream appeal

21/25

I have tried to sum up stages 1️⃣ and 2️⃣ of all of this in a diagram - with the rationale (and high resolution versions of it) explained on my blog jonworth.eu/cduvorsitz-202…

22/25

There is more useful background in this Guardian piece by @philipoltermann theguardian.com/world/2021/jan…

23/25

This by @CER_EU's @SophiaBesch looks at the polling for the CDU, and how Coronavirus has boosted the party - but #CDUVorsitz calls this all into question cer.eu/insights/choos…

24/25

Lastly, you can follow the candidates on Twitter too:
@_FriedrichMerz
@n_roettgen
@ArminLaschet
@Markus_Soeder
@jensspahn

Any questions about any of this? Let me know and I'll do my best to answer!

25/25

Erratum: tweet 12/15 is ill phrased. The party leaderships of CDU and CSU will determine who the Chancellor Candidate will be, but that person has to be able to command majority support among MdBs. Important: it's *not* Members making this choice!