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Germany's Merkel Slams Scholz as Her Conservatives Plunge to Record Low
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September 7, 2021
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0:49Now PlayingChancellor Angela Merkel warned that the Social Democrats would lead Germany in the wrong direction in an unusually direct intervention in the election campaign as her conservative bloc slumped to a new low in the polls.
In a Forsa poll for RTL/ntv, support for the Christian Democrat-led bloc dropped two percentage points to 19%, its lowest level in any voter survey in the post-war era. The SPD gained two points from a week ago to 25%, opening up a six-point lead.
The latest poll added a note of desperation to Merkel’s efforts to sway voters. In a sign of the growing anxiety within her camp, she gave a full-throated endorsement for conservative candidate Armin Laschet and slammed the SPD’s Olaf Scholz for not ruling out a coalition with the anti-capitalist Left party.
After 16 years running Europe’s largest economy, Merkel remains the country’s most popular politician, which means her comments could still sway voters. She has remained surprisingly quiet throughout the campaign to select her successor, only wading in recently as her CDU/CSU alliance plunges amid voter doubts over Laschet’s leadership capabilities.
“It matters who runs the country,” Merkel said on Tuesday in a feisty speech in the German parliament, her last before the Sept. 26 election.
Germans will have the choice between a government led by the SPD and the Greens, which “would accept the support of the Left party,” she said, echoing talking points from Laschet’s campaign. The alternative would be a conservative-led government with Laschet as chancellor, which “would stand for stability, reliability and restraint.”
Scholz, finance minister and vice chancellor for Merkel’s final term, has run his campaign by positioning himself as the rightful heir to her legacy. Her speech seemed a rebuttal to his strategy in the final weeks before the vote.
More: trib.al/n6o4vQo
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