Friedrich Merz secured parliamentary backing as Germany’s new chancellor on the second attempt, paving the way for the conservative leader, finally, to take charge of Europe’s biggest economy but with his authority considerably diminished.
In a repeat Bundestag ballot on Tuesday in Berlin, Merz got 325 votes, more than the required 316 out of 630 lawmakers. He had earlier managed only 310 in an initial tally that was meant to rubber stamp him as the head of an alliance of his center-right CDU/CSU bloc and the center-left Social Democrats, even though the coalition partners have 328 seats between them.
That was the first time since World War II that an incoming chancellor had failed to secure enough votes in a first round, leaving lawmakers stunned and disrupting the usual serene pageantry of a handover of government.
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