The Greens in the Bundestag plan to organize a constitutional complaint against the 2025 federal budget. They accuse the government of misusing billions of euros from a special fund for infrastructure and climate protection. Lacking votes for a norm control, they seek support from civil society.
In Berlin, Greens politicians announced plans to prepare a constitutional complaint at the Federal Constitutional Court in Karlsruhe against the 2025 federal budget. Deputy parliamentary group leader Andreas Audretsch criticized that the Union and SPD had misappropriated billions of euros and violated the Basic Law. "Billions that should have flowed into infrastructure and climate protection ended up 'in consumption and fossil past,'" he said. These allegations are supported by two legal opinions commissioned by the party.
The criticism focuses primarily on the credit-financed special fund for infrastructure and climate protection, amounting to 500 billion euros. The Greens accuse the federal government of not using the borrowing capacity for additional projects but instead diverting it on detours for "election gifts" like the mothers' pension. Greens budget expert Sebastian Schäfer stated that the investment ratio in the budget is calculated misleadingly.
The 2025 budget, with expenditures of 502.5 billion euros – 25 billion more than the previous year – was approved by the Bundestag on September 18, 2025, three months before year-end. The delay stemmed from the collapse of the traffic light coalition and a government change; a provisional budget had applied beforehand. The Bundesrat approved it at the end of September. The 2026 budget was passed at the end of November 2025.
Lacking the necessary votes in the Bundestag for a norm control, the constitutional complaint is the only option for the Greens. Citizens who feel their basic rights are violated can file it. "We will approach civil society to increase pressure on the federal government," Schäfer said. The initiative aims to ramp up pressure on the government, though a successful lawsuit is not guaranteed.
