General debate: Berlin instead of New York: Merz relies on the home game

He had the choice: UN General Assembly in New York or home game in the Bundestag. Chancellor Friedrich Merz decided to stay at home. The CDU leader will speak for the second time within eight days in a general debate in parliament.

Reforms: Will Merz be concrete this time?

In the last week it was about the household 2025, this time it is the budget 2026. However, general debates are not about the details of the figures, which this time is 3449 pages thick. It’s about the great lines of government policy. And there will be interesting what the Chancellor comes up with after only a week.

Last Wednesday, he asked for support in the upcoming reforms of the social system and for patience. “The autumn of the reforms will not be the last season in which we change the country for better,” he announced. “A winter, a spring, a summer, will connect a next fall with reforms.”

But Merz did not specifically. So the question is: is there more this time?

Russia: How does Merz feel about the shooting debate?

Even if the Chancellor’s audience in Berlin only comes from one country and not from 193 as in the General Assembly of the United Nations, an essential part of his approximately 25 to 30-minute speech should also be about foreign policy again.

There are enough topics, for example the latest injuries to NATO’s airspace by Russia and the reactions on it. US President Donald Trump spoke out on Tuesday in New York for the shooting of Russian planes that penetrate the NATO airspace. How does Merz behave?

Israel: Does the Chancellor position himself for sanctions?

The Chancellor had completely left the war in the Middle East last week in the Bundestag. It is quite possible that he comments against the background of the events of the past few days. With France, Canada and Great Britain, three of the leading western industrialized nations from the “Group of the Seven” Palestine have now recognized as a state. Merz will remain in his position that this is premature.

However, he has announced that he wants to bring about a common position of the coalition for the proposals of the EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen for sanctions against Israel until the EU summit next week. The SPD is for more pressure on Israel, the CSU holds it, the CDU stands in between. At most, punitive measures against individual ministers seem to be possible – but no sanctions that affect all of Israel.

Criticism of the home chancellor

In the first few months of his term, Merz had repeatedly been criticized for having traveled to Washington, Paris or Kiev in a foreign policy, but neglected domestic politics. Now the debate seems to be reversed because Merz is leaving the UN General Assembly because of the budget consultations.

“The US President, the Chinese Prime Minister, heads of state and government from all over the world. Everyone has traveled to the UN, not because of the protocol, but because the world is in transition. And just decides who is playing along and who becomes a game ball,” says Grünen-Grammervice Agnieszka Brugger. “And Chancellor Merz? Missing.”

Wade phulic interrupts his UN-Woche for Bundestag speech

Merz himself considers the whole debate about the “outdoor chancellor” and the “inner chancellor” to be missed. “We can no longer speak of domestic politics and foreign policy, like two neatly separate spheres,” he said recently at the ambassador conference in the Federal Foreign Office. The separation of domestic political from the foreign policy world suggests that one does not have to worry about the wars out there, the aggressors, the control breakers. “She serves an almost isolationistic need.”

By the way, Merz is represented by Foreign Minister Johann WadePhul in New York. However, the CDU politician interrupts his participation in the UN General Assembly on Wednesday for his speech on the budget of the Federal Foreign Office in the Bundestag.