The parliamentary left in the SPD recently published two-sided evidence of their self-confidence.

The largest structure in the largest parliamentary group in the Bundestag not only listed the names of the 95 deputies who are members of the "PL".

Those who are in management positions, first and foremost Rolf Mützenich, the chairman of the parliamentary group, were also neatly noted, as were the committee chairmen and working group spokespersons.

The number two in the state, Bundestag President Bärbel Bas, belongs to the Parliamentary Left, the Federal Ministers Karl Lauterbach and Svenja Schulze, the party leader Saskia Esken and Secretary General Kevin Kühnert.

Mona Jaeger

Deputy Editor-in-Chief for News and Politics Online.

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The attempt to get such a list from the second-largest structure in the parliamentary group, with 86 deputies, the Seeheimers, who are not exactly described as conservative, sometimes as right-wing, is in vain.

There is such a list, but it will not be published, it said when asked.

Apparently some members don't want that.

According to reports, not even the Parliamentary Left has the list of Seeheimers.

The left in the SPD seem to be proud to have strong legs in the government faction.

How does that fit into a time when, at the request of the Federal Chancellor, the members of parliament have approved the provision of 100 billion euros for the upgrading of the Bundeswehr, when ever larger weapons with enormous destructive power are being delivered to a war zone, gas is being bought in Qatar and the Coal-fired power plants should run longer than planned?

All things that go just as little with a left-wing peace policy as with the efforts to make Germany climate-neutral.

Shouldn't the SPD-Left rehearse the uprising against the chancellor long ago?

Definitely, since for years Olaf Scholz was more of an enemy for the left in the SPD than a dream chancellor.

"This coalition makes good policies and is not unstable"

If you ask around among MPs of the Parliamentary Left, there is no sign of an imminent uprising.

Although Russia's attack on Ukraine and the threatening gestures towards NATO are a significantly greater challenge than the Kosovo war at the end of the 1990s, the red-green coalition of Scholz's social democratic predecessor Gerhard Schröder was already half a year after it started exposed to existential shocks.

None of that today.

"This coalition makes good politics and is not unstable," says Markus Hümpfer.

In an interview with the FAZ after the first six months of the traffic light coalition with all its unexpected and difficult decisions, the PL member from Schweinfurt in Lower Franconia even reiterates the wish that Scholz expressed from the start: "We don't just want to govern together for four years, but beyond.”

Hümpfer is one of the young and new members of the SPD parliamentary group.

He was born in 1992 and has a social-democratic curriculum vitae.

After graduating from high school, he trained as an industrial mechanic, worked as a machine operator for two years, then completed his vocational diploma, studied and earned a Bachelor of Engineering in the field of industrial engineering.

It is his first legislative period in the Bundestag.

When asked if he was disappointed with what had to be decided as a result of the Ukraine war, he said he wasn't.