Politics
How a Left-Wing Coalition is Taking Shape in Germany's Election
Olaf Scholz’s SPD is building bridges with the Greens as the campaign reaches its climax and polls show the parties are likely to be at the center of the next coalition.
Olaf Scholz, Annalena Baerbock and Armin Laschet at the television debate on Sept. 19.
Photographer: Tobias Schwarz/AFP/Getty Images
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Anyone tuning in to last Sunday’s election debate expecting to see the candidates going toe-to-toe would have been in for a surprise.
Social Democrat Olaf Scholz and his rival from the Greens, Annalena Baerbock, were finishing each other’s sentences and endorsing each other’s ideas, taking turns to attack Armin Laschet, who’s struggled in his efforts to clinch another term for Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats.