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A second parliamentary vote was set to be held on Tuesday afternoon after Friedrich Merz, the leader of Germany’s conservative Christian Democrats and the country’s leader-in-waiting since winning national elections in February, failed to secure enough votes to become chancellor in a first round of voting in the morning.
The setback in the first round was surprising and demoralizing for Mr. Merz, as Germany confronts mounting challenges to its economy, national security and foreign alliances.
And it was a stumble without precedent: Since the founding of modern Germany, no candidate for chancellor has ever failed to win in the first round of voting. In the secret ballot, Mr. Merz was just six votes short of a 316-vote majority, and the identity of the holdouts was unclear. In the vote, 307 lawmakers voted against Mr. Merz and nine abstained. The opposition has 302 votes, suggesting that some in Mr. Merz’s coalition had opposed him.
Hours later, Lars Klingbeil, who is expected to become Germany’s next vice chancellor, announced that a second parliamentary vote would be held on Tuesday afternoon. “It is important that Germany gets a stable government, that we can very quickly start working within reliable structures, and that we work to ensure that this country is strong and well governed,” he told reporters.
German stocks had slid on the news of the first vote, with economists warning it could be an ominous sign for Mr. Merz’s agenda to revitalize growth in Europe’s biggest economy. Germany’s blue chip index fell, led by drops in defense and energy companies that stood to benefit from the future government’s planned investment programs.
Mr. Merz’s party, its sister party, the Christian Social Union, and their coalition partner, the center-left Social Democrats, together still have enough votes to elect a chancellor and form a government.
Here’s what else to know:
Previous stumbles: It was not the first time this year that Mr. Merz had lost a high-profile vote in embarrassing fashion. In January, he stirred controversy — and nationwide protests — by forcing a vote on tough new immigration restrictions. He broke a political taboo in the process, by trying to pass the measures with the help of the far-right Alternative for Germany, or AfD. But the final vote failed, after many lawmakers from Mr. Merz’s own party rebelled.
German far right: The AfD finished second in the February elections, though no other German party will work with it. It has since been classified as far-right extremist by Germany’s domestic intelligence agency. After Mr. Merz lost the vote on Tuesday, the AfD’s chancellor candidate, Alice Weidel, called for new elections — a call that will almost certainly be ignored.
Relations with Europe: Mr. Merz had expected to be sworn in on Tuesday. If he isn’t, he will have to redo a carefully orchestrated schedule of foreign visits he was set to undertake. On Wednesday, he planned to visit Paris and Warsaw to meet with President Emmanuel Macron of France and Prime Minister Donald Tusk of Poland, demonstrating a commitment to two key alliances on what was supposed to be his first full day as chancellor.
Merz’s party: A defeat had appeared possible because of Mr. Merz’s thin coalition majority, but not likely. Carsten Linnemann, the secretary general of Mr. Merz’s Christian Democrats, said he was very surprised by the results. “The world and Europe are not waiting for us,” he said. “On the contrary, they would like us to return to stability quickly.”
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Minutes after Friedrich Merz lost a first parliamentary vote needed to become chancellor on Tuesday morning, Alice Weidel and Tino Chrupalla, the joint leaders of the far-right Alternative for Germany party, demanded that Mr. Merz resign and fresh elections be held.
“It is a good day for Germany,” Mr. Chrupalla told reporters. But he and Ms. Weidel are among a small minority in political circles in Berlin who feel that way.
Though a second parliamentary vote for chancellor is scheduled for Tuesday afternoon, the uncertainty that resulted will likely benefit the populist AfD. The party has long campaigned on the claim that mainstream parties no longer govern to help the people.
Tuesday’s mess could make that point for them. Ever since Mr. Merz and his center-right Christian Democrats won the national election in February, the AfD’s poll numbers have risen as voters take issue with the compromises that the Christian Democrats and the center-left Social Democrats have made to work together as coalition partners. The AfD won 20.8 percent of the vote in February, but the party now polls at around 25 percent, sometimes more than the Christian Democrats.
This potential boost for the AfD comes days after Germany’s domestic intelligence agency labeled the party extremist, which has reinvigorated a debate about whether it should be banned outright.
All parties, including the AfD, know that if Mr. Merz does not win the required votes to become chancellor in subsequent votes (there is no limit on how many can take place), Germany’s President will call new elections. That would likely benefit the AfD.
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German businesses had been counting on Friedrich Merz and his new coalition with the Social Democrats to reinstate two elements they had been missing under the previous government: stability and predictability.
Instead, Mr. Merz failed to win enough support to become chancellor in the first round of voting in Parliament. The shock decision sent stocks tumbling and raised questions about the ability of the next government to revive growth in Europe’s biggest economy.
Last month, the government of Chancellor Olaf Scholz scaled back its growth forecasts for the country, which is now expected to remain stagnant for a third consecutive year. President Trump’s tariffs are hurting Germany’s export-oriented economy and many businesses were looking to the Mr. Merz’s planned investment in infrastructure and defense for relief.
“This will undermine business trust in Mr. Merz,” said Carsten Brzeski, chief eurozone economist at ING bank.
German stocks slid on the news, with the country’s benchmark index down more than 1.6 percent before paring some of those losses. Shares in German defense and energy companies that had been attracting investors eager to cash in on the billions the coalition planned to spend on the military were hardest hit.
In March, Mr. Merz secured support from Parliament to ease a limit on government borrowing. The agreement also included backing for hundreds of billions of euros to invest in the country’s crumbling infrastructure that the new government had pledged to begin distributing within weeks of its election.
“Everybody was looking forward to having a stable government to start enacting the necessary reforms in an increasingly unstable political environment,” said Robert Gold, an economist at the Kiel Institute for the World Economy. “But the Parliament’s decision today just added uncertainty.”
But Mr. Gold said that if Mr. Merz were to be elected in a second round, it would not leave lasting damage. “I think this can easily be healed,” he said.
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Friedrich Merz’s chancellorship was supposed to start with a whirlwind tour: Paris, Warsaw, then Ukraine and, eventually, Washington.
The plan had been to use the visits to strengthen or rebuild key alliances and establish Germany as a leading foreign policy force in an increasingly isolated Europe. But that travel could be delayed by Mr. Merz’s failure to secure the chancellorship in the first round of parliamentary voting on Tuesday.
If and when the trips happen, any meetings with other leaders will undoubtedly be clouded by new questions over whether a Merz government can be counted on to deliver on its promises — militarily, economically or otherwise.
In the immediate aftermath of his party winning national elections in February, Mr. Merz appeared to have a weakened hand. His popularity with Germans was not high, with his Christian Democrats winning a fairly low share of the vote. But Mr. Merz was determined to play a forceful role in Europe and beyond.
“Germany is back,” he declared in March, announcing an agreement with center-left parties to relax government borrowing limits and plans to spend significantly more on national defense, infrastructure and initiatives to combat climate change. “Germany is making a major contribution to defending freedom and peace in Europe.”
That spending burst was a big reason Mr. Merz stood — and could still stand — a good chance of emerging as a key figure for a continent suffering from a leadership vacuum in France and Germany, its two largest economies. The other reason was President Trump, whose moves to impose new tariffs and threats to pull back American military support in Europe have given a shared purpose to continental leaders.
On both fronts, Mr. Merz could be hurt by the vote Tuesday, even if he quickly rebounds to secure the support he needs.
The result could be a sign that Mr. Merz may struggle to pass legislation to approve the new borrowing and military spending, which was effectively greenlit in March, but not actually appropriated.
It could also be interpreted as a sign of weakness by Mr. Trump, complicating Mr. Merz’s efforts to simultaneously push back against Washington’s defense and economic policies while cultivating a personal relationship with the president.
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Friedrich Merz was well ahead in the polls in January when he made a decision that drew hundreds of thousands of Germans into the streets in protest, and may have seeded his failure on Tuesday to become chancellor in the first round of parliamentary voting.
Germany had just been rattled by the killing of a toddler and an adult in Bavaria, at the hands of an Afghan immigrant who authorities said suffered from mental health issues. It was the latest in a string of deadly attacks committed by immigrants in Germany over the course of a year, and Mr. Merz decided it needed an immediate response.
He pushed Parliament to vote on a package of measures to toughen immigration policy — and he did so knowing that the only way they could pass would be with votes from the far-right Alternative for Germany, or AfD. That broke a longstanding taboo in German politics.
The move may have helped Mr. Merz and his Christian Democrats shore up support among voters upset over immigration. But in several ways, it backfired on Mr. Merz. First, he lost the most important vote on the measures, after members of his own party rebelled.
He then handed a potent issue to Germany’s far-left party, Die Linke, which rode the backlash to a surprisingly strong finish in the February election. Die Linke’s gains helped to undermine the strength of the center-left parties Mr. Merz needed to form a governing coalition. He entered Tuesday’s vote with a thin majority, and when he lost 18 votes from his own coalition, he failed to become chancellor on the first ballot. The loss left him six votes short of a win.
Mr. Merz may also have been hindered in the vote by his response to the protests that greeted his immigration vote. Stung by accusations that he was collaborating with the far right, Mr. Merz and allies in Parliament submitted a request for information on the tax-exempt status of progressive organizations that helped organize protests.
That request angered progressives, including Social Democrats who eventually decided to join Mr. Merz’s governing coalition anyway, seeing the move as a clear attempt to intimidate anyone speaking out against Mr. Merz and his party.
Tuesday’s vote was anonymous, so it is unclear how many Social Democrats voted against Mr. Merz — or why.
But the would-be chancellor had recently alienated members of his own party as well, for a different reason.
After campaigning on promises of fiscal frugality, Mr. Merz reversed course post-election, joining with the Social Democrats and the center-left Green Party to relax government borrowing rules in order to spend freely on the military, infrastructure and other projects.
Jens Spahn, the parliamentary leader for Friedrich Merz’s Christian Democrats, announced that a second vote would be held at 3:15 p.m. local time (9:15 a.m. Eastern). “All of Europe and maybe even the whole world is watching this second vote,” he told reporters.
Lars Klingbeil, who is expected to become Germany’s next vice chancellor, announced that a second parliamentary vote to elect Friedrich Merz would be held on Tuesday afternoon local time. “It is important that Germany gets a stable government, that we can very quickly start working within reliable structures, and that we work to ensure that this country is strong and well governed,” he told reporters.
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Getting out of Parliament and into the chancellery is only the first big problem facing Friedrich Merz. If and when he assembles the votes to become Germany’s next leader, he will inherit mounting challenges at home and abroad.
The German economy shrank last year, continuing a half-decade malaise that has demoralized workers and business leaders alike. Prospects for new growth appear dim, particularly with the threats posed to Germany’s export-oriented manufacturing sector by President Trump’s moves to impose high new tariffs.
Mr. Trump is also threatening to rip away America’s European defense umbrella, complicating relations between Germany and the United States, its most important ally of the postwar era. A hostile and aggressive Russia invaded Ukraine to the east and embarked on what appears to be a deliberate sabotage campaign targeting Europe.
Those developments drove Mr. Merz to push a centrist compromise through a lame-duck session of Parliament in March. That deal relaxes Germany’s hallowed limits on government borrowing to allow significant increases in spending on the military, infrastructure improvements and efforts to combat climate change, in an effort to bolster national security and economic competitiveness. If he makes it into office, Mr. Merz will need to command majorities to spend that newly borrowed money as effectively as possible.
He will also need to act decisively to address Germans’ concerns about a decade-long flow of immigration to the country from the Middle East, Africa and elsewhere — concerns that have been inflamed by a string of deadly attacks committed by immigrants.
And he will need to hold off the far-right Alternative for Germany party, or AfD, that has drawn nearly even with Mr. Merz’s Christian Democrats in national polls. The AfD has promised to crack down on migration, and it has gained support from voters disillusioned with Germany’s longtime governing class on the center left and the center right. It has also been classified as a far-right extremist group by German intelligence.
Mr. Merz is betting that if the government can effectively respond to voter concerns over the economy, migration and security, support for the AfD will fade. But the surprise vote Tuesday, in which he failed to get enough support to become chancellor, shows just how difficult it could be for Mr. Merz to corral an effective response to any one of those problems.
This was the moment Julia Klöckner, the president of the German Parliament, announced the vote count this morning, confirming Merz’s loss in the first round of voting.
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Friedrich Merz was poised to be sworn in as Germany’s 10th chancellor on Tuesday morning. Instead, he failed to win enough votes in parliament, which is usually merely a symbolic step, falling just six votes short of a 316-vote majority in a secret ballot.
Hours later, lawmakers said a second vote was scheduled for Tuesday afternoon local time. There is no limit on the number of votes that can take place over the next two weeks.
But if Mr. Merz fails again to secure a majority in subsequent votes, the process enters a third phase when lawmakers can select a new chancellor using a relative majority. This means that more than one candidate would be put forward and the one with the most votes, not necessarily a majority, would win. Since Mr. Merz’s center-right Christian Democrats have the most seats, he, or someone else in that party, would likely win.
But if a chancellor is elected using only a relative majority, Germany’s president, who usually plays a symbolic role, could decide to call for new elections.
This was the first time a would-be chancellor failed to secure a majority in Parliament in the 76 years of modern Germany, and the transfer of power is now paused. Ministers cannot be named or sworn in, meaning that Olaf Scholz and his cabinet will remain in a caretaker government until things are resolved.
For Mr. Merz, even if he is eventually voted in, the reputational damage to him could be severe.
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Before he returned to politics, won a national election and became the first would-be chancellor in modern German history to fail to win the job on the first ballot in Parliament, Friedrich Merz accepted an invitation to a gathering of the French Foreign Legion in Corsica.
At the last moment, the organizers asked him to arrive on the parade ground not by road or rail, but by parachute. Mr. Merz, then a corporate lawyer, had never jumped out of a plane. But a fellow attendee recalled recently that Mr. Merz did not hesitate. He made the jump — successfully, but with a bit of a rough landing.
It is not yet clear if Mr. Merz’s rough landing in his bid for the chancellery is a stumble, or something more dire. He still appears likely to become Germany’s next leader, at a pivotal time for the nation’s economy, security and role in Europe.
But his inability to secure the votes he needed Tuesday to become chancellor is an ominous sign for Mr. Merz, as he attempts to wrangle lawmakers to confront crises at home and abroad, while holding off a surge from the far-right Alternative for Germany, or AfD.
Mr. Merz is a product of the Sauerland in Germany’s wealthy west, a region that defines his politics and persona. During his campaign, he ran on the slogan “More Sauerland for Germany,” evoking the region’s image as a heartland of the country.
Supporters call him an agile politician with the potential to deliver on the big issues worrying the German public: growth, defense, immigration.
“I think he’s extremely well prepared and very deep and thoughtful,” said John P. Schmitz, a deputy White House counsel under George H.W. Bush. Mr. Schmitz helped hire Mr. Merz to work in the German offices of the Chicago law firm Mayer Brown and jumped out of the plane in Corsica with Mr. Merz around 2005.
But others say Mr. Merz struggles to plan more than one step ahead, leading him to break promises — and leaving him vulnerable to surprise setbacks like the vote Tuesday.
His about-faces on spending and migration have alienated many of his base conservative voters. Mr. Merz and his party have sagged in the polls since the election, and the AfD has drawn even with them in some surveys. Even before the loss Tuesday, he had one of the lowest approval ratings of any German leader in the modern era.
“There’s this old saying: ‘Whatever you do, act wisely and consider the end,’” said Ruprecht Polenz, a former secretary general of Mr. Merz’s party. “This thinking,” he added, “I feel is not his main strength.”
Read more about Mr. Merz, his background and his approach to politics in our profile of him.
As party leaders are scrambling to figure out when to hold a second vote, the plenary hall of the Parliament is virtually empty. Only a couple of AfD lawmakers are still in their seats.
A delay of more than a day in Merz’s swearing-in would throw a wrench into a carefully orchestrated schedule of foreign visits that he was going to undertake, starting with trips tomorrow to meet with President Emmanuel Macron of France and Prime Minister Donald Tusk of Poland.
German stocks slid after Merz failed in the first round of voting, reflecting investors’ concerns that their hoped-for return to a stable government with a focus on investment and legal changes to stimulate the economy could be at risk. Germany’s blue chip index lost 1.6 percent, led by drops in key defense and energy companies that stood to benefit from the future government’s planned investment programs.
Carsten Linnemann, secretary general of Merz’s Christian Democrats, said in a TV interview with Phoenix that he was very surprised by the results. He said his own delegates gave Merz a standing ovation after the vote, showing their full support for him. Linnemann said he was pushing to hold a second vote as soon as possible: “The world and Europe are not waiting for us — on the contrary, they would like us to return to stability quickly,”
The far-right leader Alice Weidel reacted to Merz’s failure by calling for him to resign. “We are ready to take on responsibility in government,” she said, calling for new elections.
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Friedrich Merz’s failure to become chancellor in the first round of voting is a setback, but not catastrophic for him — he remains highly likely to be the next chancellor. It was a surprise, but not a shock, because Merz’s coalition has a relatively thin majority and he has rankled some members of Parliament in the weeks since his party won the February election.
But it seems increasingly clear that Merz has a problem counting votes. This wasn’t his first failure on a high-stakes measure in Parliament. In January, he stirred controversy — and nationwide protests — by forcing a vote on tough new immigration restrictions. He broke a political taboo in the process, by trying to pass the measures with the help of the far-right Alternative for Germany, or AfD. But the final vote failed, after many lawmakers from Merz’s own party rebelled.
Although Friedrich Merz will most likely still be elected as chancellor, his failure to succeed in the first round could weaken his ability to hit the ground running and begin rolling out badly needed economic and structural changes, economists said.
“It shows that he cannot fully rely on his two coalition parties,” said Holger Schmieding, an economist at Berenberg, noting that it shows he lacks the full backing of his two coalition partners. “That will sow some doubts about his ability to fully pursue his agenda, damaging his domestic and international authority, at least initially.”
