Richard Grenell, President Donald Trump's envoy for special missions, told Newsmax on Monday that the success of the conservative Alternative for Germany party in Sunday's snap elections represents "historic change" for the country.
But Grenell, who was the U.S. ambassador to Germany during Trump's first term, bemoaned that the center-right Christian Democratic Union/Christian Social Union parties are forming a coalition with left-wing parties to prevent AfD from having sway in Parliament for Europe's largest economy.
The CDU finished first in the election with 28.6% of the vote, and AfD was second with 20.8%, nearly doubling its total in four years. The left-wing Social Democratic Party of Chancellor Olaf Scholz was third with 16.4%. The new chancellor from the CDU is expected to be Friedrich Merz, who criticized Trump on Sunday, reportedly saying his goal for Germany is to "achieve independence from the USA."
"Traditionally, the AfD has gotten around 8% or 9%," Grenell told "Rob Schmitt Tonight." "In this election, they got more than 20%. And you've got the CDU, the center-right of [former Chancellor] Angela Merkel's party. They just are in the high 20s. So, I think that there's been a historic change here. Clearly, conservative policies are what the Germans want.
"But you've got Friedrich Merz, this guy who's running the CDU, who's the replacement for Angela Merkel. Not much better than Chancellor Merkel. It's going to be watered down. It's going to be a coalition that goes with the Greens and the socialists just to avoid the conservatives. And I think that this is a disaster."
He said Merz's policies will only make the AfD's influence grow stronger among German voters.
"I think that the CDU under Merz is going to be exactly like the CDU under Angela Merkel," Grenell said. "There's going to be a lot of frustration and the [right-wing] party, the AFD, is going to grow even stronger because they're going to just watch this kind of system that just doesn't stand for anything.
"It's like Jello on the wall. You can't hold it to anything. They just say what they want to say, and it's all about elites staying in power."
Grenell added that a friend of his who ran with Merz and the CDU party, Jen Spahn, would make a better chancellor than Merz.
"He's a solid Trump-supporting Republican-type and he should be the chancellor," Grenell said. "He would really, I think, change things up."
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Michael Katz ✉
Michael Katz is a Newsmax reporter with more than 30 years of experience reporting and editing on news, culture, and politics.
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