The Berlin Linke cleared the way at its party congress for coalition negotiations with the SPD and the Greens. Delegates rejected a move to weaken existing agreements with the two parties on antisemitism. State chair Kerstin Wolter had warned that approving the motion would mean no coalition talks; about two thirds of delegates followed her appeal. With the vote taken, more than 100 Linke members are due to work in the negotiating working groups in the coming weeks, coordinated by a core team of eight representatives from the party and parliamentary group leadership. If the talks succeed, more than 19,000 Berlin Linke members will vote on the coalition agreement. The Greens and SPD have also announced member consultations.
Defense Minister Boris Pistorius opposed the prospect of a coalition with the Linke. He said the decision lay with the Berlin SPD state association but that he did not advocate a coalition with the Linke, adding that the SPD would lose trust in that case. Pistorius criticized the Berlin Linke as unclear and diffuse on important questions, especially antisemitism, where he said the party has differing internal positions. He also criticized the Linke's relationship to security authorities and criminal clans. Pistorius said he would join an initiative titled “Nicht um jeden Preis” (“Not at any price”), signed by more than 700 Social Democrats, including former Berlin mayor Franziska Giffey and former minister and SPD chair Sigmar Gabriel.
Elif Eralp, the Linke's Berlin election winner, appeared combative at the party congress. She rejected antisemitism allegations and called the publication of a memo “inadmissible.” She was accused of being unable to protect Berlin as mayor because of her “worries”; Eralp said she saw it differently and that precisely because she knows various worries she would do exactly that. She praised the results of the exploratory talks, calling it historic that socialization had been negotiated. The exploratory paper includes the expropriation of housing companies owning more than 10,000 apartments. Eralp said this meant five large housing companies would be largely pushed out of the market, which she described as a major success.
According to a Spiegel report cited in the liveblog, Eralp sees her family's safety at risk if she comments explicitly by name on the known Palestine activist Ibrahim Ibrahim, whom the coverage describes as a terror sympathizer and who has contacts to Linke members. A call to the Deutsche Presse-Agentur criticized what it called almost daily new attacks on Eralp and the state association, calling the Spiegel reporting the newest low point. It was signed by Linke leaders Ines Schwerdtner and Luigi Pantisano, Bundestag Vice President Bodo Ramelow, parliamentary group leader Heidi Reichinnek and Linke veteran Gregor Gysi. The call said it was horrifying that an internal remark in which Eralp expressed concern for her family's safety was exploited in the media and lifted onto the front page, and that holding her personal worries against her to cast doubt on her professionalism was perfidious.
Without naming Neukölln Linke MP Vanessa Emde, Schwerdtner urged party members to maintain discipline and not give political opponents an attack surface. Emde had posed on election night for a photo with Ibrahim Ibrahim. The Berlin Linke parliamentary group leadership currently sees no common working basis with her because she has distanced herself from Linke resolutions on Israel's right to exist. Schwerdtner said every provocation must be asked whether it helps only the person herself or the people she wants to serve, and that opponents were waiting for the one photo with which they could distract again. She demanded that all MPs adhere to Linke resolutions.
Lies warned about his party entering a coalition with the Berlin Linke. He said it was a heavy package with which to start in office and that he increasingly lacked the imagination to see how it would not become a permanent burden for a possible coalition. He said it now mattered that Berlin decide calmly and carefully which government could give the city stability.
Linke state treasurer Ruben Lehnert said that with the call for voting rights for all, Red-Green-Red was raising the “democracy question.” He said it was overdue that hundreds of thousands of foreigners should be eligible to vote in future. The Federal Constitutional Court has classified voting rights for foreigners as unconstitutional in its previous case law.
Separately, the black-red coalition plans a green gas and green heating oil quota for private heating. It would oblige gas and oil suppliers from 2028 to gradually switch to climate-neutral fuels, especially biomethane and bio-oil, but also green and low-carbon hydrogen and synthetic methane. Environmental associations and tenant protectors oppose the plan. The SPD also nominated Michel Friedman for the Bundesversammlung. The decision was made with the involvement of SPD parliamentary group leader Matthias Miersch, who praised the 70-year-old for standing for the decisive defense of liberal democracy and for his work against antisemitism, racism and every form of misanthropy, which he said was especially important at a time when democratic values and institutions are under pressure.
Sources: FAZ.