CSU

The FDP asked its members about remaining in the traffic light coalition. The result is just in favor of it. But the FDP will also have to make compromises in 2024.

It is a wafer-thin majority with which the FDP is starting the new year: the member survey gives the party leadership support for remaining in the government coalition. However, the result is extremely close and is unlikely to end the debates within the party. 52.24 percent of voters advocated continuing the government’s work, while 47.76 percent wanted to leave the coalition. Although the survey has no binding effect, it is seen as an important signal, especially to party leader Christian Lindner. But the result will also be met with excitement at the traffic lights.

“The result of the member survey allows the FDP to continue in government, but is also a clear warning shot,” warns Frank Schäffler, FDP member of the Bundestag and one of the most outspoken traffic light critics, on X (formerly Twitter). “We cannot continue as before. The FDP must stand up for its positions more clearly and resist the ‘greening’ of politics.” There have recently been heated arguments between the Liberals and the Greens, particularly because of the so-called heating law, but also because of the austerity measures following the Constitutional Court ruling.

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FDP membership decision: Many in the FDP are struggling with the traffic lights

However, the party leadership has been trying for weeks to handle the member survey with the greatest possible composure. Lindner speaks of a “clear mandate to continue to show a liberal profile in government action.”

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The deputy FDP chairman Wolfgang Kubicki said: “It is a good result because it shows both the will to remain in the traffic light and the will to change.” The party will meet for its traditional Epiphany meeting on January 6th, and the party is likely to do so there too Voting and cooperation in the coalition will be an issue. Kubicki demands: “Now we have to do everything we can to make the Free Democrats so strong that we can go into the federal election in 2025 with a broad chest. This can only be done together.”

The opposition views the results of the survey more critically. “The FDP is completely torn and therefore unable to act in the long term,” says CSU General Secretary Martin Huber to our editorial team. “A narrow majority is clinging to maintaining power and is therefore missing an opportunity for the urgently needed new beginning.” From the CSU’s perspective, the country can only get out of this crisis through new elections.

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Only a fraction of FDP members took part in the vote

Only 26,058 of the approximately 72,100 FDP members took part in the survey – just a little more than one in three. They were able to participate online for two weeks. The question was: “Should the FDP end the coalition with the SPD and the Greens as part of the federal government?” The answer could be yes or no.

Since joining the traffic light government after the 2021 federal election, the FDP has lost massive amounts of support. In current surveys it is only at 5 percent – in the election 11.5 percent of voters voted for it. Since then, the party has been thrown out of several state parliaments, and dissatisfaction has grown, especially at the grassroots level. The election year 2024 also threatens to be difficult. The polls for the fall state elections in Saxony, Thuringia and Brandenburg place the Liberals at three to five percent. The initiative for the member vote followed an open letter from 26 state and local politicians from the FDP. They see the party’s direction at risk primarily from necessary compromises within the traffic lights.

But compromises will also be required of the Liberals in 2024. The budget for 2024 is still up in the air. In January, the Bundestag’s Budget Committee is scheduled to discuss necessary savings and cuts; a resolution in the Bundestag is planned for the end of January. The issue of migration is also likely to continue to lead to heated debates. SPD party leader Saskia Esken recently clearly rejected the plan to relocate asylum procedures to countries outside the European Union.

2024-01-01 16:29:17
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