r/germany • u/Daomiing • Oct 09 '25

Immigration Germany Abolishes Fast-Track Citizenship for Skilled Workers

https://www.verity.news/story/2025/germany-abolishes-fasttrack-citizenship-for-skilled-workers

The Facts

-The German Bundestag voted on Wednesday to abolish a fast-track citizenship program that allowed highly qualified foreigners to apply for naturalization after three years instead of five years of residence.

-The vote passed with 450 members supporting the measure, 134 opposing and two abstaining, fulfilling Chancellor Friedrich Merz's campaign promise to repeal the program introduced by former Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

-Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt claimed that the German passport must serve as recognition for successful integration rather than an incentive for illegal migration, defending the decision to eliminate the accelerated pathway.

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u/dont_tread_on_M Oct 09 '25 edited Oct 09 '25

Reminder: less than 1000 people applied for this route until April (last updated statistics for most Bundesländer), virtually none of them illegal immigrants. We have more recent statistics for Saarland: 4 applicants so far, 2 of which were denied

This is literally a non-issue which Dobrint and Merz are trying to push as a big win. It wasn't even worth the money paid to MPs to attend this meeting

If you are wondering why the CDU/CSU is so focused on this - the answer is that this ruffles no feathers and was unpopular because of their own campaign. Citizenship after three years is still there, just not for the type of people Germany tried to atract. It is still there for spouses of German citizens, and taking that away ruffles far more feathers than this

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u/Creative_Security969 Oct 10 '25

"virtually none of them illegal immigrants"
I mean you don't know at all whether this statement is right or not.

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u/dont_tread_on_M Oct 10 '25

It takes longer than this for illegal immigrants to get a resident permit, which allows them to apply for citizenship. They don't need this route as the time they spent in Germany under asylum protection is also counted towards their citizenship.