Jens Spahn at Maischberger: On the AfD question he winds himself

When Sandra Maischberger welcomed her guest Jens Spahn (CDU) the evening before, it was about the look back. Spahn came to the Bundestag at the age of 22. He has now spent more than half of his life there. There was also a record of 2002, with Spahn as a dynamic Twenty-Something in a beige suit. Sandra Maischberger initially wanted to know whether these figures are startled by him. “I was the youngest in the parliamentary group and in the Bundestag,” said Spahn. “That changed, this time passed very quickly. And the jackets have become a little darker.”

Spahn told about his trips through the constituency – in the Golf I Cabrio, his first car. He had checked a few times, “especially after the last election defeat”, Spahn confessed, but “the dynamics had remained”. 150, 180 percent have to be given in top politics, “you have to want that,” said Spahn. He wanted that, “it burns” with him.

Maischberger made it clear with a quote from Spahn’s Abi-Zeitung that this fire was blazing during school. Spahn had given “Chancellor” there when they want to work. Now he is CDU parliamentary group leader, as Maischberger, as in front of him Adenauer, Kohl, Merkel and Merz. He was more close to his goal than ever before. How much could Merz rely on him when it comes to “organizing” majorities after the Chancellor’s election hasn’t worked out? Spahn with the perhaps shortest answer of the evening: “Friedrich Merz trusts me, I trust Friedrich Merz, otherwise we would not do that in this constellation. Point.”

Whether Union and SPD can rule without a dispute was the thematic bracket for talking to Jens Spahn. It is initially in an essential point with Matthias Miersch, the SPD parliamentary group leader: “We want to be stability factors in a restless time. To this government, there is a lot. There is a lot of war in Europe. We are in the recession. We are polarized, like never before in the Federal Republic. Stability factors are. “

With a party like the AfD in the Bundestag, in addition with 152 seats, the question of stability is a particularly acute one. Maischberger asked how to look out when two-thirds are required, for example when it comes to a change in the Basic Law. Then does the incompatibility decision fall? In January, the vote on stricter rules for asylum seekers made high waves. At that time Friedrich Merz had accepted the AfD votes. How would that be now?

“We have a majority for everything we are doing,” replies Spahn. “That’s why I speak of a change in the Basic Law,” replies Maischberger. Spahn expires in election campaign stakkato. “Restricting family reunification, control over illegal migration, economic growth, reducing energy costs, depreciation, reducing bureaucracy”, all of this would have been tackled, for this you have the necessary majorities.

Maischberger doesn’t let up. And what about the two -thirds majorities? Spahn: “We will always coordinate with the SPD. If you ask me if I can rule out that the AfD ever agrees to our laws? No. Do the laws become worse? No. (…) My task is that our goal is that we also have this majority, and we will implement this accordingly.”

Maischberger quotes the CDU parliamentary group leader again. It was only in April that he had to deal with the AfD, like with any other opposition party. In the meantime, the AfD is considered secure right -wing extremist. The MPs have now been informed that no committee chairman of the AfD is elected with the votes of the Union MPs. Normal handling? And what about the two -thirds majority? After some back and forth, Maischberger surrendered with a smile: “I hold on, today we won’t clarify that. You don’t want to commit yourself, that is, you may be open to a door.”

Spahn then underlines it again: “With the classification by the Federal Constitutional Protection as a secure right -wing extremist, the situation has of course also changed. We take it very, very seriously. We will see what conclusions are drawn from it, but of course such a decision changes something. That is why we have not chosen the committee chairman together with the SPD today.”

Finally, the Pope ended up using the Spahn method, the difficulties of the Atlantic alliance in the face of an erratic US president and the men’s clique in the coalition committee. The new Pontifex, what does Jens Spahn trust him? “I don’t really know him. Even as Catholic, I heard the name for the first time on the day of the announcement,” he smiles. “I hope he can bring the church together, hold together and, if in doubt, show the American President, who was very happy about the American Pope, how important it is to work with others.”