According to dentist statements
CDU social wing distances itself from party leader Merz
September 30, 2023, 8:30 a.m
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Political opponents take to the barricades, the Union defends its party leader against them. Now there is also criticism from the CDU about the statements about refugees and supposedly hundreds of thousands of visits to the dentist. There are even open doubts about his possible suitability as a candidate for chancellor.
After his statements about dental treatments for rejected asylum seekers, CDU leader Friedrich Merz now has to face severe criticism from his own party. The deputy head of the CDU social wing, Christian Bäumler, called on Merz to withdraw his statements or to forego running for chancellor. “Merz’s derailments are incompatible with the Christian view of humanity. Many CDU members are ashamed of their party leader,” said Bäumler. Merz split the CDU. Many CDU members had previously supported the statements of their party leader.
Merz had said that rejected asylum seekers had their teeth done in Germany and thus took away Germans’ appointments at the dentist. Bäumler is the deputy federal chairman of the Christian Democratic Workers’ Association (CDA).
The SPD, the Greens and the Left Party had previously criticized Merz for his statements. There was also opposition from the Federal Dental Association. The CDU leader literally told the television station Welt: “They’ll go crazy, the people, when they see that 300,000 asylum seekers have been rejected, not leaving the country, getting full benefits, getting full medical care. They sit at the doctor and let themselves be get your teeth changed, and the German citizens next door don’t get any appointments.”
In fact, asylum seekers only receive rudimentary treatment from doctors during the first 18 months of their stay in Germany. Only then will they receive a health card, as regulated in paragraphs 4 and 6 of the Asylum Seekers Benefits Act.
Al-Wazir: Only the AfD benefits from this
Hesse’s Deputy Prime Minister Tarek Al-Wazir also took action against the CDU leader. “All I can say is that you don’t fight the enemies of democracy by adopting their slogans and then starting to spread fake news yourself. And in this respect, Friedrich Merz would certainly be well advised to simply broadcast what he said to the world “What he has set, which really has nothing to do with the truth, is taken back again,” he said on Friday.
“I think the idea that someone would risk their life and go to the Mediterranean because they would like to have an appointment with a German dentist is so absurd that Friedrich Merz would certainly be well advised to stop spreading things like that “In the end, just make sure that it’s not the CDU that benefits, but only the AfD,” continued Al-Wazir.