Trump, Merz and the future of the US-German friendship

There’s no new government in Germany quite yet, but after Sunday’s election, it’s all but certain that Friedrich Merz of the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) will be the next chancellor. He, along with the CDU and its Bavarian sister party CSU, will have to find coalition partners to govern. One of the big talking points since the results came out is how Germany, and Europe will deal with US President Donald Trump. After his party’s victory in the election was confirmed Sunday night, Merz said that he wanted to work on creating unity in Europe as quickly as possible, “so that, step by step, we can achieve independence from the US.”

