Snapping at Merz's heels throughout this parliament will be the far-right Alternative für Deutschland (AfD), now the main opposition force in the Bundestag. The AfD wants to close Germany's borders, deport migrants en masse, end weapons supplies to Ukraine and re-open ties with Putin's Russia. Last week, the AfD was officially classed as an extremist organisation by domestic intelligence (BfV), re-igniting a debate about whether the party should be banned. The AfD has now said it's suing the BfV, accusing it of an "abuse" of power. And the designation was publicly denounced by senior figures in Donald Trump's US administration – including vice president JD Vance. Managing relationships with Trump's White House will be another balancing act for Merz, a committed Atlanticist who raised eyebrows on election night when he declared Europe should "achieve independence from the USA". Nevertheless, Merz's government will "invest a lot to keep the transatlantic relationship going" says the GMF's Claudia Major. There's speculation he may even "go for golf" – a reference to seeking to woo golf-mad Trump by playing some holes out on the fairway. But Merz's first trips abroad are set to be to Paris and Warsaw, relationships he claims suffered under Olaf Scholz. It's "high time" to improve German-Polish relations, says Agnieszka Pomaska, a member of the Polish Sejm and member of Prime Minister Donald Tusk's Civic Platform party. "We need to invest together in the army, in defence," says Pomaska, who says that Scholz's government was "politically weak" and "it's never easy to cooperate with a government that is simply weak". "We didn't have this feeling that was very much present during previous years that Germany is one of the leaders in the European Union."