The Greens are meeting today for their small party conference, the so-called state council. It’s getting uncomfortable for the party leadership: the EU asylum compromise is creating a bad atmosphere at the grassroots level.
If you ask Omid Nouripour about Bad Vilbel, he smiles. The scene of this state council awakens feelings of home in the Green co-boss. “That’s Frankfurt, that’s where I come from, it’s a home game,” says Nouripour.
But this home game is far from won for him. Because the atmosphere at this party congress will be tense: it is seething at the base. Many members of the Greens are dissatisfied with decisions that their party supported within the federal government: arms deliveries to a war zone, the longer lifetime of nuclear power plants, the construction of liquid gas terminals and now the European Union’s asylum compromise.
Ironically, Green cabinet members have agreed that asylum law should be tightened – with the aim of letting fewer migrants into the EU. Federal Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock and Federal Economics Minister Robert Habeck said “yes” to this. And thus two leaders of a party that sees a humane migration policy as one of its brand cores.
Asylum policy overshadows the party congress
“The resentment in the party is great right now, across all wings,” says Timon Dzienus, co-chair of the Green Youth. She stands for left-wing positions within the party and is traditionally progressive. Dzienus assumes that the asylum compromise will overshadow the state council and lead to lengthy discussions.
That could be a realistic scenario when you look at the many amendments: A total of 46 have been received by the Greens in the past few days. There are quasi correction proposals to the text of the federal executive board on migration policy. Normally, not every amendment is debated at a Green party conference, that would go beyond the scope. The federal board contacts the applicants before and during the event and tries to adapt the wording in such a way that the application becomes obsolete.
The Green Youth has probably introduced the clearest change proposal. There it says that Germany’s approval of the asylum compromise was “wrong”. According to the wishes of the Green Youth, the party should only agree to the final decision of the EU if there are “substantial improvements” to the plans.
Green youth opposes EU asylum compromise
The influence of the Green Youth should not be underestimated. At the state council in Düsseldorf a good year ago, she introduced an amendment to the Bundeswehr’s special assets. The green youth organization did not want the 100 billion euros to go to the Bundeswehr unconditionally. And the motion almost got a majority.
Should something similar happen at this meeting in Bad Vilbel, i.e. the Green Youth should get away with changing the text on migration policy, it would be an embarrassment for Foreign Minister Baerbock and Economics Minister Habeck. Because the green party would then position itself against their “yes” to the EU asylum reform.
More than 80 Green members of the state parliament want to further increase the pressure: They sent a letter to the delegates of the party congress in the evening. In it, they urgently warn against stricter European asylum laws and call for a “policy that is more compatible with human rights” from the party leadership.
Disgrace for Baerbock and Habeck?
Co-party leader Nouripour remains relaxed. “We are the Greens. We are known for passionately discussing and sometimes arguing, that’s part of it,” he says in an interview with the ARD Capital Studio. In the end, he says, the party will join hands and fight together to improve the situation of refugees.
In the lead motion of this state council, which is to be discussed at the very beginning, things should run more smoothly for the party leadership. It is about climate-neutral prosperity, justice and security. The coalition dispute over the Building Energy Act will probably also be discussed. But there is not a single amendment to it. The promised home game of Omid Nouripour in Bad Vilbel – at least in the Greens’ core issue of climate protection, a victory could succeed.