Dr. Hans-Georg Maassen is founder of a new German political party. He was President of the German internal security service (Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution) from 2012 to 2018. He was let go by Chancellor Angela Merkel in October 2018 for contradicting her. On February 17, 2024, he founded a new German conservative party, the Values Union (“WerteUnion”) out of the former conservative grouping within the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), with around 4,400 members. The Values Union aims to fill the gap between the CDU and the right-wing AfD party, and says its goal is to restore a stable conservative government to Germany.
On Feb. 17, 2024, my fellow conservatives and I founded a new German party called the Values Union (“WerteUnion”) dedicated to restoring common sense to German politics.
After 46 years in the Christian Democratic Union (CDU), I did not take this step lightly.
But after years of struggles, we had to realize that the CDU does not stand for conservative values anymore.
Angela Merkel opened the German borders to mass immigration from mainly Muslim countries and took the CDU far to the left. The CDU is no longer the opposition to the socialist parties, but has become just another socialist party, in the opposition.
The CDU party leadership spends more time fighting conservatives within their own ranks than the leftist government. They show no sign of reaching out to the many people disappointed with the disastrous leftward course Germany has taken, but instead are busy erecting “firewalls” against people they call “right-wing”.
The current leader of the CDU, Friedrich Merz, is the former chairman of the board of BlackRock Germany. BlackRock Investment was instrumental in introducing so-called ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) standards worldwide, which often also target Israel.
I view the political role of BlackRock and other such financial institutions very critically. These companies not only want to make money, they also represent a political ideology and want to use other people’s money to exercise power and change the world. They have consciously used their financial power to exert political influence on German companies and apparently also believe they can buy their way into entire governments. This is the only way to understand why so many representatives of the financial industry now have political positions, not just in Germany. I am afraid we have to view CDU head Friedrich Merz as a BlackRock representative.
The Values Union will cooperate with everyone who supports our goal of saving Germany from the disastrous left-wing agenda. At the general assembly of the Values Union January 20th, we declared we will hold talks with the CDU only if they are willing to change course.
The Values Union will be neither libertarian nor socialist, but stands for a social free market economy. Today, our social free market economy is in danger of being replaced by an eco-socialist planned economy based on the “climate” agenda.
We believe a social system is necessary to help people when they fall on hard times. We are free-market liberals, but not radical libertarians. We do not want to abolish the government and are not against the welfare state, but rather for its reform. A welfare state is necessary for social equality and justice. But we also want to provide a political home to free-market conservatives.
When we founded our party Feb. 17, we received threats from Anarchist radicals. Out of security concerns, we held the founding on a cruise boat on the Rhine between Remagen and Bonn, accompanied by police patrol boats. At the same time, German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser has weaponized the security services to combat the right-wing opposition.
German media reported that I am being surveilled due to alleged “far-right” activities. The 20-page file my lawyer received from them contained my newspaper articles criticizing mass migration, and cited people who reposted my tweets. That’s enough to be considered “far-right” in Germany today.
I’m afraid the current German government has transformed the security services into almost a Secret Party Police. This has become a danger for the German public and German democracy,
At the same time they are neglecting the dangers of Islamic terrorism. I have been warning against the infiltration of German parties and government by Islamic extremists and agents of foreign governments since I was the head of the German security service. Unfortunately, my warnings have not been heeded, and today are more urgent than ever.
The greatest challenge during my time as President of the Office for the Protection of the Constitution were Islamist terrorist infiltrators that the Islamic State other groups had sent to Germany, disguised as asylum seekers.
Well over 20 of these terrorist operatives who came to Germany to carry out attacks were identified and arrested.
Another major challenge were Islamist lone perpetrators who radicalized themselves via the Internet and planned their own attacks. Identifying these lone wolf attackers, who were often completely under the radar, was a huge challenge. I worked very closely with my colleagues from Mossad and Shabak on this. I have visited Israel many times and look forward to going again soon to meet new friends.
As the new German conservative party, the Values Union is fully committed to supporting Israel and its right to self-defense. Israel is the only democratic state in the Middle East based on the rule of law, which shares the Judeo-Christian values our party is founded on. For many years I have urged that Israel should be invited to join NATO. I believe this is more urgent than ever today.
Translated by Collin McMahon, sent to Arutz Sheva.