Frauke Brosius-Gersdorf still struggled with retreat

The lawyer Frauke Brosius-Gersdorf has not yet digested her withdrawal from the candidacy for a judge’s office at the Federal Constitutional Court.

“It is a decision that I honestly say that I still struggle with, because it ultimately prevailed in unnecessary campaigns,” said Brosius-Gersdorf of the weekly newspaper “Die Zeit”.

The decision was still correct because it was clear at some point that it would not be chosen. “I had the impression that the dispute within the coalition could be so exaggerated that there was no more reasonable way out. It was also important to me to prevent damage to the Federal Constitutional Court,” said the lawyer, who teaches at the University of Potsdam.

Because of the reserved from the Union against the Brosius-Gersdorf nominated by the SPD, the election of three constitutional judges was canceled in July. In August she finally pulled her candidacy back.

The SPD then sent Sigrid Emmenegger into the race. Last week, she was finally elected new constitutional judges together with Ann-Katrin Kaufhold and Günter Spinner on the second attempt for judge election.

She is pleased that the election worked, said Brosius-Gersdorf. “This is good for the Federal Constitutional Court, but also for our democracy”. In the “time” she spoke of a “roller coaster ride of feelings”. “I won’t forget this summer so quickly,” said the lawyer.

Brosius-Gersdorf denied the question of whether Chancellor Friedrich Merz (CDU) had ever contacted her. “I know him from a collaboration many years ago, which I remember as pleasant. But I didn’t really find it right that he declared the judge’s election in the Bundestag’s plenary on a question of conscience,” she said.

“This is not a question of conscience, but a personnel decision for which a two -thirds majority in the Bundestag is required and for which the opposition is also needed,” she said.

After all: Union faction leader Jens Spahn (CDU) called her immediately after her declaration of withdrawal. “It was a short phone call in which he admitted that some things didn’t go so well. And that he regrets that.”

Brosius-Gersdorf does not see her reputation as a lawyer by the processes for the election. “For a while I was concerned that my call from non -lawyers can suffer, from commercial enterprises, social associations, individuals.” The past few weeks have shown that the concern was unfounded.

Brosius-Gersdorf expressed the hope that the “politicization of the judge’s election” that was experienced in summer could remain a unique case. “Thank God we have not experienced a politicization of the judiciary, it works independently. The trust of the population in the judiciary and above all in the Federal Constitutional Court is rightly high,” said Brosius-Gersdorf.