Friedrich Merz imitates Donald Trump – does that bring him to the Chancellery?

Who would have thought that the new American President Donald Trump would be so stylish for German politics in such a short time? Sure, there were already imitators like Markus Söder (who else?), Who, based on Trump’s model at McDonald’s, had his photographing how he was drawn in paper bags. Also at Alice Weidel it seems not surprising that they now copy Trump’s “I love you all” on the party congress of their AfD, of course in the German translation: “I love you all.”

But now Friedrich Merz also imitates the man in the White House. Apparently impressed by the presidential arrangements that Trump signed immediately after his swearing-in stacks, the Union Chancellor candidate announced after the fatal knife attack in Aschaffenburg that he was chosen on the first day in the Chancellery on all German borders and one Removal of entry for foreigners without valid papers.

It is noteworthy that Merz doesn’t seem to be so bad. The Sauerländer benefits from the fact that a clear majority of the population, according to surveys, supports a rigid course in migration policy. Irony of history: If Merz was supposed to make rejects at the border that Angela Merkel always rejected, the election victory, of all people, would have helped him with her politics.

Merz ‘appearance also lives from the contrast to the incumbent Olaf Scholz, who was photographed on the evening of the crime in Aschaffenburg with a dark expression and the bosses of the security authorities, but had not offered much to the Bavarian authorities in addition to allocations. The German election campaign resembles the American when Joe Biden was still a candidate, in that the Scholz, which was moted from three years, does not appear to be more politically weak after years and constitution, but still appears more politically than his challenger.

But there is more Trump in Merz. In the dispute over a possible approval of the AfD for the applications of the Union in the Bundestag, his keyword was called for days: No matter. He does what he thinks is right, and if you want to participate, you should participate, and if you don’t want to participate, you should leave it. But that is the real copy of the American president: Merz does not only break with his own resolutions, as he had postulated for dealing with the AfD himself. He also doesn’t make up much of political style grades in the public debate. Rather, he pumps the defiant “I don’t care” into a personal trademark. And that was always one of Trump’s secret of success: to ignore expectations.

What Merz very likely cannot remove the day after the election is the compulsion to a coalition. And then the German variant of Trumpism reaches its limits. If Merz ‘election campaign does not lead the CDU to the AfD, which he still promises, he keeps leading further away from the possible government partners – also because Merz has excluded compromises.

In Washington, where the reigning president lives from polarization, this works. In Berlin, where the Parliament chooses the Chancellor, a consensus in the middle is constitutive – and one thing is certainly not: no matter.