After Friedrich Merz was chosen as the CDU and CSU’s candidate for chancellor, NRW Prime Minister Hendrik Wüst (CDU) advised the Union to adopt a new style. “The Union is a government in waiting. This brings with it a different responsibility,” Wüst told “Spiegel”. People feel the excessive demands of the traffic light government every day. “You no longer have to describe it to them in constant, intensive detail. It would actually be extremely dangerous to constantly paint a bleak picture,” warned Wüst. “The feeling that Germany is broken, that this country is no longer viable, that everything is bad, that is what extremists feed on. They live off of it.”
The CDU politician advised against “always hitting out or bad-mouthing the country – sometimes perhaps even worse than it is.” But that does not mean that the Union will stop criticizing the government. The crucial question, however, is: “How do we criticize and how much space do we take up describing the situation?” You always have to name what is going wrong: “But then you should describe in more detail how we want to make it better.”
Wüst was convinced that this approach would pay off. “The style I am proposing is not only good for the discourse and deprives extremists of support. My experience is that you get a lot of support for it. And very good election results.” When asked whether 35 percent plus x was possible for the Union, the CDU politician said that was what pollsters described as possible and what Merz had also expressed as potential.
Procedure discussed with Merz
Wüst was considered a possible candidate for chancellor for the Union. On Monday he announced his withdrawal and his support for CDU leader Merz. On Tuesday, Merz and CSU leader Markus Söder announced in Berlin that the CDU leader should become the sister parties’ joint candidate for chancellor.
NRW Prime Minister Wüst told the news magazine that his approach had been discussed with Merz. “We coordinated intensively over weeks and months. I also informed him of my decision.” He also spoke to Söder again and again and “shared my thoughts with him in advance.”
With a view to the election campaign, Wüst warned that the Union must remain “a people’s party of the centre, which is accepted by broad sections of the population”. This includes being visible as a party of the workers. “We must be the social conscience in the party structure of the Federal Republic,” warned the NRW government leader.
On the major controversial issue of migration, Wüst hopes for amicable solutions between the Union and the coalition as an “alliance of the center”. “I would be very happy if the parties of the democratic center made far-reaching decisions before the election and acted in such a way that the issue is cleared up afterwards,” said Wüst. If the CDU and the Greens in North Rhine-Westphalia manage to agree on a comprehensive package for migration and security, the same should be possible between the Union and the traffic light coalition at the federal level. “The situation is really critical. We sense that people in the country are becoming increasingly concerned,” said Wüst.
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