That’s what I’m looking for, thank you. Interesting to see that Habeck was one of the candidates whose first vote ended up not counting (I understand he still got in, but it feels oddly symbolic of Green fortunes).
Update on the state of events as of today:
- The parties in the new government (CDU/CSU and SPD) have concluded a coalition agreement, that in this published form
https://www.spd.de/fileadmin/Dokumente/Koalitionsvertrag2025_bf.pdf (German language)
has 144 pages. The 4.588 lines of the text have been helpfully numbered so we can always be clear about what we quarrel about in the next four years. And quarrel we will.
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CDU and CDU (Christian Democrats) have ratified the agreement in special party conferences.
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The SPD (Social Democrats) have ratified it in a members’ vote (we have been that way for more than the last decade - do only trust any particular leadership as far as we can throw them, cannot even agree on a single leader but have dual leadership.). There have been a lot of in-person and much more online conferences for the membership in the run-up for the online vote with federal/state committee members and parliamentarians. On the whole the membership has come to the conclusion that we can and must ratify - the vote was 84.6 % in favour.
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Today the new Chancellor has been elected. The incoming Chancellor, Friedrich Merz, had an unprecedented upset: the number of Bundestag votes needed to elect a Chancellor is 316. CDU/CSU and SPD have 328 votes between them. In the first vote Merz only got 310 votes. In the second vote he was elected with 323 votes, he and his new Cabinet sworn in - phew. No Chancellor before started with that kind of political black eye. The reason probably is that both he and the new Vice Chancellor, Lars Klingbeil (SPD), made enemies in their respective parties.