AWhen Nancy Faeser became Federal Minister of the Interior a good year ago, she was hardly known outside of Hesse. In this respect, she can almost be happy about the cross-party accusation that she cannot be minister and top candidate at the same time for eight months. She is now perceived as a real competitor.
Recently, SPD politicians were more relegated than climbers, see Christine Lambrecht, see Manuela Schwesig. In general, the Hessian SPD has shown a talent with its personnel that one would no longer have credited it with.
Does she still have to put everything on Hessen?
For voters, however, a decision by Faeser other than that of dual office should be more meaningful. She only wants to move to Hesse as Prime Minister, and in the event of a defeat in Berlin, continue to lead one of the largest and most important departments in traffic lights. Chancellor Scholz could most likely live with a weakened Minister of the Interior. A defeat in Hesse should be less painful for him than for his party, which hopes to reconquer a non-city state from the Union.
But that puts Faeser in a quandary: she needed and needs the prominent office until the state elections in October in order to have a chance at all against CDU Prime Minister Boris Rhein and the Greens. At the same time, Faeser shies away from the political risk with the attractive fallback option. The top candidate is already counting on defeat. It’s good that the voters already know that. But that wasn’t politically wise. Faeser’s chances of winning the election may have dropped at the moment his candidacy was announced.
She will now have to observe the dynamics of the election campaign. Will she still have to put everything on Hessen in the summer if the SPD does not gain enough ground in the polls? “It’s not the time to campaign,” asserts leading candidate Faeser confidently. The CDU and the Greens will see things differently.