Politics · Germany · 3 hrs ago
Cologne CDU will keep proposals even if AfD votes for them
Serap Güler, head of the CDU in Cologne, says the party will change how it handles votes in the city council.
The CDU will no longer withdraw its own proposals just because the far-right AfD might vote for them.
Güler says this does not mean the CDU will cooperate with the AfD.
The party’s rules bar cooperation, she says, but do not require it to abandon its own ideas.
The CDU has previously avoided proposals that could pass with AfD support, and Güler says this left it vulnerable to pressure from the Greens and Social Democrats.
She says the AfD has become more extreme, not more moderate, since the CDU ruled out cooperation in 2018.
Güler also warned that giving the AfD responsibility in government would be a costly experiment, and said the prospect of it overseeing areas such as police, justice and schools in Saxony-Anhalt worried her.
The change she announced concerns Cologne’s council; the sources give no further details about when it will take effect.
Cologne CDU leader Serap Güler says the party will no longer withdraw its own proposals just because the AfD might support them.
Güler said the practice had made the CDU vulnerable to pressure from the Social Democrats and Greens.
She said the decision does not change the party’s ban on cooperation with the AfD.
Güler said the AfD had become more extreme, not more moderate, since the CDU ruled out cooperation in 2018.
She also warned that AfD participation in government in Saxony-Anhalt would be a costly experiment.
- Who
- Cologne CDU leader Serap Güler announced the change in approach.
- What
- The CDU will not withdraw its own council proposals just because the AfD could vote for them. Güler said the party would not cooperate with the AfD.
- When
- Güler announced the approach in an interview published on October 11, 2026.
- Where
- Cologne, Germany.
- Why
- Güler said withdrawing proposals had been a misunderstanding of the party’s “firewall” against the AfD and had made the CDU vulnerable to pressure from the Social Democrats and Greens.
This story does not have two clearly opposing sides.
There is a difference between cooperation and suicide out of fear of death.
Withdrawing our own proposals because the AfD could support them is the latter.
The AfD has not become more moderate, but the opposite is the case.
There is no messiah.
The CDU ruled out cooperation with the AfD at its federal party conference.
Güler announced that the Cologne CDU would no longer withdraw its own proposals because the AfD might support them.
- City
- Cologne
- Party leader
- Serap Güler
- Publication date
- October 11, 2026
- CDU decision on AfD cooperation
- The party ruled out cooperation in 2018
- Proposals
- The Cologne CDU will keep its own proposals even if the AfD might support them.
Sources
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