Union factions threaten Karlsruhe complaints against possible Berlin and Saxony-Anhalt governments

Three state faction leaders issue a warning

Union faction leaders in Lower Saxony, Bavaria and Thuringia have threatened to take possible new state governments to the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe. The three, Sebastian Lechner, Klaus Holetschek and Andreas Bühl, named both cases explicitly: a government led by the Left Party in Berlin and one led by the AfD in Saxony-Anhalt. A joint paper, a letter available to the German Press Agency (dpa), states that coalition talks in both states have not yet been concluded successfully since the elections. Die Welt said it held the statement exclusively.

The constitutional argument

The paper argues that anyone who governs a state is bound by the Basic Law and the rule of law, and that election results give radical or extremist parties no licence to cross constitutional limits. It notes that each state can ask the Federal Constitutional Court to review another state's laws. The faction leaders say they will press the state governments entitled to apply to do so consistently where state laws clearly breach the Basic Law, and will take the initiative themselves where they hold government responsibility. The procedure at the centre of the threat is Normenkontrolle, in which the court tests laws against the Basic Law.

Berlin: the coalition paper as a template

The paper uses the exploratory result of Die Linke, the SPD and the Greens in Berlin as its example of the breaches it fears. It cites what it calls exorbitant borrowing beyond the limits of the debt brake, the introduction of a voting right for foreign residents that it considers unconstitutional, and the planned socialisation of housing. The Union also warns of a significant weakening of Berlin's security authorities, and in particular the police. The letter presents these points as things that could happen under a Left-led government, since no such coalition has been formed.

Saxony-Anhalt: school attendance and the intelligence agency

In Saxony-Anhalt the criticism targets the AfD. Its announced plan to abolish compulsory school attendance, in the paper's words, raises fundamental questions about compatibility with the constitution. CDU and CSU also fear a weakening or abolition of the Verfassungsschutz, the domestic intelligence service. The Union argues that these matters affect the community of states as a whole, not only Saxony-Anhalt.

Pressure from Chancellor Merz and the CSU

Federal Chancellor Friedrich Merz has raised federal coercion under Article 37 of the Basic Law, known as Bundeszwang, which Focus reports the federal government has never used against any state. According to Focus, Merz made the move under the impression of the AfD's result in Saxony-Anhalt, and the SPD and Greens quickly backed him. Markus Söder, chairman of the CSU, became the first state premier to join, threatening to cut Länderfinanzausgleich payments to a Left-led government in Berlin. Focus adds that such a step would require a constitutional complaint and cannot be settled politically between states or between federation and states.

Open questions

Neither coalition had been agreed when the statements were published, so the threatened complaints depend on governments that do not yet exist. The sources give no date for when either state government would take office. Focus calls the Berlin and Saxony-Anhalt outcomes a democratic test that is approaching, but does not set a date for it. The Union's paper leaves open which specific laws it would challenge and when, beyond the examples it names.