At a time when the rapid expansion of detention and deportation practices in the U.S., U.K., and Australia has already instilled fear among immigrants, the German government has also started tightening its immigration rules. Germany’s parliament this week repealed the fast-track citizenship program, marking the beginning of a tougher stance toward immigrants. This move reflects the rapidly changing attitude toward immigration in Europe’s economic powerhouse, which is facing a severe labor shortage.

During this year’s election campaign, Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s conservative party had pledged to rescind the law, which allowed “exceptionally well-integrated” individuals to obtain citizenship in three years instead of five.

“A German passport must come as recognition of a successful integration process, not as an incentive for illegal immigration,” Interior Minister Alexander Dobrindt told parliament.

The rest of the new citizenship law — a key achievement of former Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democrat–liberal–Green coalition government — will remain intact, despite earlier conservative pledges to undo reforms such as dual citizenship and the reduction of the waiting period from eight years to five.

The SPD (Social Democratic Party), now a junior partner in Merz’s coalition, defended its support for the change, saying the fast-track process had been rarely used and that the essence of citizenship reform remained intact.

Of the record 300,000 people who obtained German citizenship in 2024, only a few hundred did so through the fast-track system, which had originally been designed to attract highly skilled and mobile workers — at a time when Germany is struggling with an acute labor shortage.