The CDU chairman Friedrich Merz has rejected the proposal from the traffic light coalition to improve the electoral law reform that has been passed and to enable list connections between the CDU and CSU. "We feel it is downright encroaching that the coalition wants to use election law to decide how the CDU and CSU should line up in federal elections. World on Sunday".

"CDU and CSU are two friendly, but also independent parties who have decided to run in geographically different electoral areas and not to compete. It will stay that way, no matter what other political parties think of it," explained Merz. The CSU only competes in Bavaria, the CDU only in the other federal states.

The five percent clause will apply from 2025 without exception

With the electoral law reform passed by the traffic light coalition against the protests of the opposition, the five percent clause will apply without exception from 2025: the so-called basic mandate clause will no longer apply. So far, it has ensured that parties with the strength of their second vote result in the Bundestag also entered the Bundestag if they were less than five percent but won at least three direct mandates. The Left Party benefited from this in 2021. Depending on the election result, the omission could also have consequences for the CSU.

A list connection is an alliance of several parties that stand for election together. The list connection is assigned a number of mandates according to its result, which are distributed internally according to the vote share of the respective party.