Now it’s out: Robert Habeck has declared that he wants to run as a Green Party candidate. He is going into the election campaign with a mortgage – and yet he is the right candidate for his party, finds capital city correspondent Rebekka Wiese.
He had planned it differently. At the beginning of the week it was said that Robert Habeck wanted to announce his candidacy for the Greens on Thursday. The Economics Minister and Vice Chancellor seemed to have no idea that the traffic light coalition would collapse the evening before.
Now, two days after the government alliance was broken, he declared that he wanted to run as a candidate: “If you want, also as chancellor,” he explains in a video. He didn’t have much other choice in terms of time: the federal party conference of the Greens is taking place in a week, at which the delegates are supposed to vote on his candidacy. But time pressure is not Habeck’s biggest problem. As a Green Party candidate, completely different difficulties await him.
A mortgage for the election campaign
The party is in a crisis that also has to do with Habeck. If you look at surveys, you can clearly see when the Greens’ bumpy numbers turned into decline. It was in March 2023 after the draft for the controversial heating law was passed. That doesn’t mean that Habeck alone is responsible for the crisis. It may not be his fault that the debate about the law was so irrelevant. But it is the mortgage with which he is campaigning.
Nevertheless, the Greens have little choice but to put him up. Not declaring a candidacy of this kind would mean retreating into the niche. And despite his mortgage, Habeck is the only one who can be trusted to carry out the rescue mission. To do this, he must achieve the feat that he already managed as state minister in Schleswig-Holstein and then as party leader of the Green Party: bringing different camps together. However, that is much more difficult today – especially since many accuse the Greens of polarizing themselves.
Habeck probably shouldn’t hope for the chancellorship. If he manages to prevent the Greens from falling, he would have already achieved a lot for his party.
