Hans-Georg Maassen leaves the Christian Democratic Union

phg. The former head of the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution, Hans-Georg Maassen, is leaving the CDU. Maassen confirmed to NZZ that he would leave the CDU. He will inform his district union of his resignation on Friday. “When a horse dies, you have to take the saddle off – and the CDU is not only heart-dead, but now it is brain-dead as well,” he says.

The expulsion process has been ongoing in the party for about six months. In November 2023, the CDU court in Thuringia rejected this exclusion. Any appeal against the decision to the next higher authority, as party leader Friedrich Merz announced, will not be necessary once Maassen leaves.

The statute of the Union of Values ​​Party has been “essentially” completed.

Maassen believes that his political home lies entirely in the Union of Values, which he heads. The registered union was founded seven years ago because some advocates felt the union had moved to the left under then-President Angela Merkel. At the end of last week, members of the Values ​​Union decided during their meeting in Erfurt that the union would establish a new party with the same name. The goal is to exceed the 5% barrier in the three East German state elections scheduled for the fall.

Maassen has now told NZZ that the founding party's conference will be held in mid-February and that the platform is basically ready. CDU leader Merz had already made clear that simultaneous membership in the CDU and the Union of Values ​​would no longer be possible under his party's rules.

Maassen accuses Merkel of “leading us one step towards the abyss, and now we have taken another step forward.” It was also Merkel, in her capacity as Chancellor, who relieved Maassen of his position as head of the domestic intelligence service in 2018.

Masen disagrees with the firewall principle

Even under Friedrich Merz, Maassen does not see any improvement in the CDU, as he put it. At the beginning of his term, Merz was considered a favorite of Maassen and the Union of Values. “Mears didn't deliver on that promise,” says Maassen. He has done little against the federal government's “ecosocialism.” Masen wrote on the SMS service

Maassen is also dissatisfied with Merz's firewall principle against the AfD. Maassen explains that the Values ​​Union wants to talk to all political forces in the future, as there is no place for firewalls in a free society.

Many people in the CDU should breathe a sigh of relief over this decision. Maassen's comments were a disgrace to the party, as has been said over and over again. For this reason, the process of expelling the party began. Maassen himself wants to create a “maximum serious” alternative for middle-class voters with the new party, which opinion polls believe has potential of up to 15%.