Merkel Coalition Looks Hard at Options After Key Resignation
- Finance Minister Scholz says he won’t take over as SPD head
- Dreyer, Muetzenich interim candidates for Nahles’s twin roles
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Germany’s two main governing parties will try to pick up the pieces of their rattled coalition on Monday after poor election results triggered the unexpected resignation of one of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s key allies.
The Social Democrats, the junior coalition partner, will begin searching for an interim chief after Andrea Nahles said she lost the support of her party, part of which wants to ditch Merkel’s Christian Democrat-led bloc in hopes of rebuilding voter trust. The chancellor’s CDU will engage in a second day of soul-searching following its own setbacks in last month’s European elections and uncertainty over Merkel’s succession.