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Chancellor candidate Baerbock
Photo: POOL / REUTERS
As a candidate for chancellor there is no break.
Every step is observed, every reaction assessed, every mistake punished.
Annalena Baerbock has had this experience for weeks, and her election campaign is suffering.
The post-registered additional income, the plagiarism affair about your book, the résumé.
Then the tide came.
With the flood disaster in the west of the republic, a topic has now actually moved to the center of the election campaign in which the Greens have the highest attribution of competence: the fight against climate change.
In a poll by the opinion research institute Civey for SPIEGEL recently, 56 percent of Germans agreed with the statement that Baerbock, as Chancellor, would make a decisive contribution to tackling climate change.
Your competitors Armin Laschet and Olaf Scholz, on the other hand, came in at 26 and 35 percent, respectively.
But again Baerbock made a mistake that distracted from their content.
And not on any subject, but in an area that the Greens have written as their main focus.
In an interview with the Central Council of Jews, Baerbock told about a case from her circle of friends.
A student refused to work on a worksheet that had the N word on it.
While she was talking about it, Baerbock uttered the word himself.
She later became aware of this in the conversation, the Green leader later explained. That is why it was considered afterwards to cut out this part of the interview, because the question was "whether the haunting example is suitable to point out the grievances in the education sector".
After receiving a media request, Baerbock published the video excerpt, which was provided with a beep at the appropriate point, on Twitter on Sunday, along with an apology: »Unfortunately, in the recording of the interview, I have that in the emotional description of this unspeakable incident Quoting the N-word and thus reproducing it, «wrote the politician.
“That was wrong and I'm sorry.
Because I know about the racist origin of this word and the injuries that black people experience from him, among other things. "
Second debate on racist term
In May, the Greens had a heated debate about the term.
Tübingen's controversial mayor Boris Palmer used the word in a Facebook comment, which ultimately prompted the Baden-Württemberg state association to start a party exclusion procedure against him.
Palmer later explained his choice of words as an "ironic stylistic device".
Baerbock, too, criticized Palmer's choice of words at the time as "racist" and "repulsive".
The candidate made it clear in her Twitter post on Sunday that she definitely does not want to be put in the same corner as Palmer: Baerbock wrote about two different incidents in "different contexts".
Nonetheless, the misstep remains a major nuisance in the middle of the election campaign.
After all, the Greens stage themselves as a champion against racism and have dedicated a separate subchapter to the topic in their election manifesto.
You are the party that presented an action plan against racism in February and published an appeal to the federal government in March calling for it to combat right-wing extremist and racist violence more consistently.
The fact that the green candidate for chancellor is now reproducing a racist term is more than unfortunate for her and her party.
In an area in which the Greens want to set standards, they have to consistently meet them in order to remain convincing.
Baerbock's misstep now looks as if she has strayed from a path that her party has set itself.
Campaign apologies
The candidate is accordingly contrite.
And party colleagues have remained calm about the incident so far.
Once again, Baerbock is now on the defensive.
This Monday was planned completely differently.
The candidate presented the Greens' plans for better civil protection and announced that the party would also add further proposals for adaptation to climate change and an updated immediate climate protection program in the coming days.
"You know we haven't been working on this topic since yesterday," explained Baerbock.
But after the flood it was dealt with intensively again.
"We can no longer afford the Union's clutter." Instead, we now need a sensible climate policy.
The thrust is clear: the climate and the environment are green issues.
There the party has an important strength and a clear line that could also help it in the election campaign.
The fact that Baerbock has now made a mistake on another green core issue, of all things, does not make the start of this offensive any easier for the party.
Annalena Baerbock can be credited for having apologized extensively for the use of the racist term and for openly reflecting on her behavior.
The only question that remains is how many missteps and apologies she can still afford in this election campaign.