Trump won the Republican primary in Iowa. The Union is now putting pressure on the traffic lights. It is “irresponsible” not to prepare for a possible victory.
After former US President Donald Trump’s success in the first Republican primary election, the Union is putting greater pressure on the traffic light government to prepare for Trump’s new term in office. “The federal government can no longer ignore the domestic political developments in the USA. The USA is too important as a partner for that,” said the foreign policy spokesman for the Union parliamentary group in the Bundestag, Jürgen Hardt (CDU), to the German Press Agency in Berlin.
The Iowa caucuses showed two things: “40 percent did not vote for Trump. And yet it is high time to prepare for a President Trump.”
The parliamentary managing director of the Union faction, Thorsten Frei (CDU), said that Trump had achieved a better result than eight years ago in the same place. You have to prepare for the fact that Trump will come out on top in the end. “Then Germany and Europe have to learn to walk and grow up,” said Frei. He called it “irresponsible to go into such a situation so unprepared.” The Union is always available for discussions with the traffic light in order to find a solution to the question of how to position ourselves as strong and resilient. The Bundeswehr must become combat-ready and capable of defending itself, and civil defense must also be strengthened.
Clear victory for Trump
Trump had achieved a clear and surprisingly quick victory in his party’s primary elections in Iowa. Several US television channels declared the ex-president the winner on Monday evening (local time) just over 30 minutes after the start of voting. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis took second place by a clear margin. Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley came in third. The two were in a neck-and-neck race for second place.
The CDU foreign policy expert Norbert Röttgen told the “Tagesspiegel” that the preparation for Trump included, among other things, “that we have to increase our arms production so that Ukraine can defend itself against the Russian attack even without US help. Europe’s freedom depends on this.” .
According to the deputy parliamentary group leader of the Green Party, Agnieszka Brugger, a radicalization course under Trump has negative consequences for international politics that aim at security, solidarity and the preservation of international law even in the run-up to the election. The current debate in Congress about aid for Ukraine shows how dangerous the isolationism in large parts of the Republican Party is for European security, said Brugger, according to the statement. “It is all the more necessary these days that Germany from the center of Europe continues to send stronger, long-term, substantial signals of support to Ukraine and that the EU quickly strengthens its ability to act and sovereignty, especially in matters of foreign and security policy.”