Local time on May 6th, Friedrich Merz, the CDU/CSU Union's candidate for Chancellor, failed to be elected as Chancellor in the first round of voting held in the German Bundestag on the same day. He received 310 votes in favor during the vote, which was 6 votes short of the 316 votes required to become Chancellor, a situation that has never occurred since World War II. The Union, where Merz belongs, holds a total of 328 seats in parliament. Since the vote is conducted in secret, it is currently unclear and may forever remain unknown who defected from Merz's camp.
The German tabloid "Bild" reported, citing sources from the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) and the Christian Social Union (CSU), that Merz decided to give up participating in the second round of voting for the German Chancellor election. If this message is true, Germany will not have a new Chancellor by local time on May 6th, and all of Merz's planned visits scheduled to begin on May 7th will be uncertain.
Source: https://www.toutiao.com/article/1831367411890442/
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