German Coalition Turmoil Deepens After SPD Minister Quits

Germany’s fragile government was plunged deeper into turmoil on Monday after the labor minister, co-chair of the junior coalition partner, abruptly resigned from both her posts.

The resignation of Social Democrat Baerbel Bas came as Chancellor Friedrich Merz was meeting senior CDU officials on the second day of a leadership retreat intended to regroup after the party’s recent election setbacks. The timing turned an effort to steady the conservatives into another test of the coalition’s stability. Finance Minister Lars Klingbeil, the SPD’s other co-chair, canceled a planned trip to India.

The coalition entered the week under pressure after September elections in Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, where the far-right Alternative for Germany emerged as the strongest party. Merz’s CDU slumped to 17.2% in Saxony-Anhalt, and it failed to enter the Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania parliament with 4.9% — the first such exclusion in the party’s history.

Bas was at the center of politically contentious reforms spanning the social-welfare system, with her ministry handling key pieces, including pension and working-time legislation. As the coalition wants to pass its broader pension overhaul by the end of the year, replacing Bas is more than a routine personnel change.

Public Attacks

Bas, 58, said she needed time to grieve after the sudden death of her stepdaughter. She also criticized “public attacks,” including from members of the CDU/CSU bloc, that she said had continued during the difficult period. Union politicians had accused her ministry of moving too slowly on pension and working-time measures agreed by coalition leaders on July 1.

She will retain her seat in the Bundestag.

Klingbeil told reporters in Berlin that Bas had informed him of her decision on Saturday. He criticized the personal attacks against Bas during her mourning period as totally unacceptable and “indecent.”

“This is poisoning our political culture,” Klingbeil said. “It’s often women in leadership roles facing such unusually harsh attacks and criticism. It’s hate and smear campaigning.”

Klingbeil nominated Rhineland-Palatinate Premier Alexander Schweitzer as next labor minister and proposed an extraordinary SPD party congress for December or January to elect new party leaders. The Social Democrats will stick to the principle of having two co-chairs, he added.

The next party co-chair must be a woman from left wing of party, said people familiar with the matter, but they discounted Manuela Schwesig, the popular premier of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, who is currently involved in coalition talks there.

While Klingbeil canceled the India leg of an Asia trip due to what finance ministry officials called “current developments,” the status of his onward travel to Bangkok for the IMF and World Bank annual meetings remained unclear.

Merz said that Bas’s decision demands “respect.”

“As father and grandfather I can only guess how heavy this loss is,” Merz wrote on the platform X. His spokesman, Stefan Kornelius, denied a media report that Merz himself had voiced frustration about Bas’s absence in an off-record briefing even though he was aware of the the minister’s personal situation.