"apologized for his choice of words. Künast also stated that any future cooperation with the Left was ""miles away"", particularly in light of the party's rejection of Gauck. The SPD and Greens also blamed The Left for the election of Christian Wulff. Gysi, on the other hand, criticized the SPD of not cooperating with his party, which is considered extreme by federal authorities, and again pointed out differences in political positions between Gauck and the Left. On 2 July 2010 Wulff was sworn into office as President of Germany. 2010 German presidential election An indirect presidential election (officially the 14th"
"Christian Social Union (CSU), President of the Bundesrat, served as acting head of state. In the days following Wulff's resignation, the media speculated about several candidates, among them Joachim Gauck, Thomas de Maizière and Klaus Töpfer. Chancellor Angela Merkel said she would consult with the Social Democrats and The Greens to find a consensus candidate to replace Wulff. On 19 February 2012, the governing coalition's CDU, CSU, and FDP and the opposition SPD and Greens agreed on independent Joachim Gauck, the 2010 presidential candidate of the SPD and Greens, as their joint candidate. This happened after the FDP, the SPD,"
"the Bundesrat, Jens Böhrnsen, until Christian Wulff was elected president on 30 June 2010. Wulff himself resigned less than two years later after allegations of corruption were levelled against him. Wulff resigned on 17 February 2012 and was succeeded by Joachim Gauck. Since leaving office, Köhler continues to voice his opinion on selected foreign and domestic policy matters, most notably on Europe-Africa relations, the global fight against poverty and climate change as well as on the need for a new spirit of global partnership. Between 2010 and 2011, Köhler served as member of the Palais Royal Initiative, a group convened"
"draw to Christian Wulff, the candidate of the government coalition. His candidacy was met by significant approval of the population and the media; ""Der Spiegel"" described him as ""the better President"" and the ""Bild"" called him ""the president of hearts."" Later, after Christian Wulff stepped down, Gauck was elected as President with 991 of 1228 votes in the Federal Convention in the 2012 election, as a nonpartisan consensus candidate of the CDU, the CSU, the FDP, the SPD and the Greens. A son of a survivor of a Soviet Gulag, Gauck's political life was formed by his own family's experiences"
"lifting of Wulff's presidential immunity due to well-founded initial suspicions of favoritism and unethical behavior. On February 17, 2012, Wulff resigned as German Federal President. Explaining his resignation, Wulff stated that ""(the German people's) trust and thus his effectiveness have been seriously damaged"" and that ""for this reason it is no longer possible for him to exercise the office of president at home and abroad as required."" A new presidential election was required within a month to elect his successor. Until a new President was elected, Horst Seehofer of the Christian Social Union (CSU) was acting president. The new president,"
"the election of Joachim Gauck on 18 March 2012. Under Seehofer's leadership, the State of Bavaria took to the Federal Constitutional Court in 2012 in order to dispute the legality of Germany's post-World War II system of financial redistribution among the country's 16 states. Bavaria, a beneficiary of the system until 1988, had paid more in 2011 than it got out in the 40 years it was a net recipient. The State of Hesse, another per-capita contributor, joined the lawsuit. Also under Seehofer's leadership, the CSU won an absolute majority in the 2013 state elections, heralding strong momentum for the"
"incumbent Minister-President Günther Beckstein and Chairman of the CSU, Erwin Huber, announced their resignations. Seehofer was quickly proposed as their successor. At a party convention on 25 October he was affirmed as the new Chairman of the CSU with 90% of the votes, and on 27 October he was elected Minister-President by the Landtag with votes from the Free Democratic Party, forming the first coalition government in Bavaria since 1962. During the term 2011–2012, Seehofer served as President of the German Bundesrat. As such, he acted as Acting President of Germany between Christian Wulff's resignation on 17 February 2012 and"
"Die Linke's position as ""bizarre and embarrassing,"" stating that he was ""shocked"" that the party would declare Joachim Gauck their main enemy due to his investigation of communist injustice. According to Gabriel, Die Linke had manifested itself once again as the successor of the East German communist party. A politician of Die Linke compared the choice between Gauck and Wulff to the choice between Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin, drawing strong condemnation from the SPD and Greens. In the election on 30 June 2010, Gauck was defeated by Christian Wulff in the third ballot, with a margin of 624 to"
"and the Greens had strongly supported Gauck and urged CDU to support him as well. The SPD chairman, Sigmar Gabriel, had already stated on 17 February 2012 that Gauck was his party's preferred candidate, alleging that Gauck enjoys ""great trust from the citizenry"". Reportedly, Merkel conceded to FDP chairman (and Vice-Chancellor) Philipp Rösler's staunch support for Gauck; the agreement was announced after the FDP presidium had unanimously voted for Gauck earlier on 19 February. The Free Voters in Bavaria and the Danish minority party, the South Schleswig Voter Federation, also supported Gauck. On the night of being nominated, Gauck warned"
"the incumbent Premier of Lower Saxony, was nominated as the candidate of the government parties (CDU, CSU, FDP). Prior to this, Federal Minister of Labour Ursula von der Leyen (CDU) had been considered the front-runner for the nomination of the government parties. Because the Constitution of Germany forbids the President to hold other offices, Christian Wulff resigned from his seat in the Landtag of Lower Saxony on 11 June 2010 and announced to leave the supervisory board of Volkswagen the following week. He resigned from his post as Premier of Lower Saxony upon being elected as President on 30 June,"
"Papier ended in 2010, Voßkuhle became the youngest President in the history of the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany. In February 2012, Chancellor Angela Merkel offered Voßkuhle the opportunity to succeed Christian Wulff as President of Germany, after the president's resignation. He later declined the offer. After Norbert Lammert, the President of the Bundestag, criticized the court's 2009 ruling on the Treaty of Lisbon, Voßkuhle wrote in an op-ed piece in the daily newspaper ""Süddeutsche Zeitung"" that Lammert's statements were ""strong words for a non-lawyer"" and hardly served to ""foster a culture of respect."" Lammert eventually came around and upon"
"SPD chairman Sigmar Gabriel described Die Linke's position as ""bizarre and embarrassing,"" stating that he was ""shocked"" that the party would declare Joachim Gauck their main enemy due to his investigation of communist injustice. According to Gabriel, Die Linke had manifested itself once again as the successor of the East German communist party. Social Democrats and Greens expected the Left to support Gauck at least in the decisive third round of the election. But after Jochimsen had withdrawn, most Left electoral delegates abstained. Wulff was elected by an absolute majority. The party was isolated ahead of the 2012 presidential election,"
"president and for which he had already apologized. As more allegations of possible corruption emerged, the prosecutors in Hanover, the capital city of the state of Lower Saxony, asked the Bundestag to lift Wulff’s presidential immunity in order to investigate the possible granting or accepting of undue favors. Pre-empting this, Wulff resigned on 17 February 2012, explaining that the loss of the people's trust had damaged his effectiveness. To win, a candidate must win an absolute majority on one of the first two ballots or a plurality on the third. Until the new President was elected, Horst Seehofer of the"
"31 May 2010. He won 625 of 1242 votes on the third ballot of the Federal Convention. He became Germany's youngest president at the age of 51 and was sworn in on 2 July 2010 in front of the Bundestag and the Bundesrat. His main contender in the election was Joachim Gauck, a civil rights activist from East Germany and a former Federal Commissioner for the Stasi Records. Not a member of any party himself, Gauck was nominated by the opposition SPD and Greens as their presidential candidate on . Wulff was succeeded as Premier of Lower Saxony by David"
"the international financial system. When Federal President Joachim Gauck announced in June 2016 that he would not stand for reelection, Schäuble was soon mentioned by German and international media as likely successor; the post eventually went to Frank-Walter Steinmeier instead. From late 2016, Schäuble served as member of the German government's cabinet committee on Brexit at which ministers discuss organizational and structural issues related to the United Kingdom's departure from the European Union. Following the 2017 elections, Schäuble was nominated by the majority CDU/CSU parliamentary group as the next president of the Bundestag, succeeding Norbert Lammert. In his capacity as"
"succeeded Gerhard Schröder who became Federal Chancellor. Because he had been linked with various scandals in his home city of Brunswick, he resigned in 1999 and was replaced by Sigmar Gabriel. From 2003 to his election as Federal President in 2010 Christian Wulff was minister president in Lower Saxony. The Osnabrücker headed a CDU-led coalition with the FDP as does his successor, David McAllister. After the elections on 20 January 2013 McAllister was deselected. Between 1946 and 2004, the state's districts and independent towns were grouped into eight regions, with different status for the two regions (""Verwaltungsbezirke"") comprising the formerly"
"Niebel (2009-2013) and Gerd Müller (since 2013). Günter Nooke Günter Nooke (born January 21, 1959) is a German CDU politician and a former civil rights activist. Nooke was born in Forst (Lausitz), Germany, a small town in Brandenburg. He grew up there only 150 km (90 mi) southeast of Berlin, in the communist German Democratic Republic (GDR), near the Polish border. He was educated in Forst, Cottbus and at the University of Leipzig, where he studied physics from 1980 to 1985. After graduating Nooke worked as a research assistant, latterly as a head of section from 1985 to 1990 at"
"a separate candidate but failed to do so before the election. The number of seats per party is as follows: Voting started at noon. At 14:24 on 18 March 2012, Gauck accepted his election. He was elected in the first ballot with 991 votes in the Federal Convention. Bundestag president Norbert Lammert announced the result. In reaction, Gauck exclaimed: ""What a beautiful Sunday"", also referring to the anniversary of 18 March 1990 when East Germans had been able to vote freely for the first time. European Commission President José Manuel Barroso congratulated Gauck. Quoting Goethe, he said: ""Freedom and life"
"times more than 80,000 in the red. In March 2013 the Hanover district attorney offered to settle the case in exchange for a fine. On April 9, Wulff announced that he had rejected this deal. Three days later the prosecution filed corruption charges against Wulf. The only remaining allegation against him concerned a Munich hotel and food bill of 770 euro paid by Groenwold. On August 27, 2013, the Hanover regional court announced that it would try Wulff on accepting unfair advantages, after downgrading the initial corruption charges. On February 27, 2014, two years after his resignation, Christian Wulff was"
"Coalition"" of the Christian Democrats (CDU together with the Bavarian CSU) and the SPD following the 2013 federal elections, Lammert was part of the CDU/CSU delegation in the working group on cultural and media affairs, led by Michael Kretschmer and Klaus Wowereit. When Federal President Joachim Gauck announced in June 2016 that he would not stand for reelection, Lammert was soon mentioned by German and international media as likely successor. In October 2016, Lammert announced that he would not stand in the 2017 federal elections but instead resign from active politics by the end of the parliamentary term. Following the"
"categorical interests and, by default, mayors without a declared label claiming No political sensitivity, be it left, center or right. The AUT (other) grade replaces the DIV grade without changing its definition. Salome Zurabishvili won the 2018 presidential elections as an independent candidate, becoming the first-ever female President of Georgia. Joachim Gauck, President of Germany from March 2012 to March 2017 and the first Federal President without party affiliation, was to date the most prominent independent politician. In the German presidential election of 2010 he was the candidate of the Social Democrats and Greens, in 2012 the candidate of all"
"the ruling CDU/CSU parties for election as President of Germany in the 2010 presidential election, but Christian Wulff was eventually chosen as the parties' candidate. The news media later reported that Wulff's nomination came as a blow to Merkel, whose choice of Leyen had been blocked by the two parties' more conservative state premiers. In November 2010, von der Leyen was elected (with 85% of the votes) as one of four deputies of CDU chairwoman Angela Merkel, serving alongside Volker Bouffier, Norbert Röttgen and Annette Schavan. Later that month, she told the ""Bild am Sonntag"" newspaper that the CDU should"
"husband's election as Minister-president of Bavaria in 2008, she has undertaken a great number of representative duties, and is the protector of many charitable organisations. Karin Seehofer Karin Seehofer (born April 1958) is the second wife of the Bavarian Minister-President Horst Seehofer. After Christian Wulff's resignation on 17 February 2012, her husband became acting head of state of Germany in his capacity as President of the German Bundesrat, until the election of Joachim Gauck on 18 March 2012. She is also a cousin of American author Konrad Dryden. Her parents owned a small brewery, Brauerei Stark, in Schamhaupten. She worked"
"in January 2012. A Jamaica coalition is currently in power in the state of Schleswig-Holstein. After the Schleswig-Holstein state election, 2017, CDU leader Daniel Günther became Minister President by forming a coalition with the Free Democrats led by Wolfgang Kubicki and the Greens led by Monika Heinold. A Jamaica coalition was unsuccessfully negotiated at the national level in Germany following the 2017 federal election. After the SPD initially announced their return to opposition, it became the only viable coalition that didn't involve Alternative for Germany. Coalition talks failed after the FDP pulled out of talks, citing an inability to find"
"2004 Christian Democrat federal convention in Düsseldorf, when Wulff was re-elected deputy leader of the federal party with roughly 86 per cent of all delegates supporting him. However, the premature dissolution of the Bundestag in 2005 and the subsequent election of Chancellor Angela Merkel largely put an end to further speculation about Wulff's future at the time. A Wulff candidacy for the CDU nomination for Chancellor was seen to appeal to northerners and liberals within the Christian Democrats. Outside the mold of a typical conservative, he was able to attract swing voters disillusioned with the slowness of reforms, as well"
"Joachim Gauck, was elected on 18 March by a Federal Convention. After the request by the district attorney's office in Hanover to lift Wulff's immunity had been leaked to the press, there were media reports that the prosecutors had questioned Wulff's explanation that he reimbursed Groenwold in cash when checking out of the hotel in Sylt in August 2008. The investigations showed no corresponding withdrawals on Wulff's bank account that would back up his claim. In view of Wulff's negative account balance leading up to the Sylt vacation, prosecutors deemed the possibility that Wulff had kept a cash gift from"
"Coalition"" of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democrats (CDU together with the Bavarian CSU) and the Social Democrats (SPD) following the 2013 federal elections, Schummer was part of the CDU/CSU delegation in the working group on education and research policy, led by Johanna Wanka and Doris Ahnen. Ahead of the Christian Democrats’ leadership election in 2018, Schummer publicly endorsed Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer to succeed Angela Merkel as the party’s chair. Uwe Schummer Uwe Schummer (born 14 November 1957 in Adelaide, Australia) is a German politician of the (CDU) from Willich. Schummer has been a member of the Bundestag since 2002. Since 2014"
"parliamentary group. Stefan Birkner Stefan Birkner (born 12 April 1973 in Münsterlingen) is a German politician for the Free Democratic Party. Birkner was elected to the Lower Saxon Landtag in the 2008 state elections. However, in February 2008 he left the Landtag to become a State Secretary for the State Minister of the Environment in the second cabinet Wulff, Hans-Heinrich Sander. He was replaced by Christian Grascha. From January 2012 until 2013 he served as State Minister for Environment, Energy and Climate Protection in the government of Minister-President David McAllister. In September 2017, Birkner succeeded Christian Dürr as chairman of"
"Christian Wulff's resignation. He later served as co-chairman of the Federal Government’s Ethics Commission on a Safe Energy Supply. Since 2013 Töpfer has been heading the project ""DEMOENERGY – The Transformation of the Energy System as the Engine for Democratic Innovations"" together with Claus Leggewie and Patrizia Nanz (both Institute for Advanced Study in the Humanities Essen, Germany). In 2016, the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) appointed Töpfer as co-chairman (alongside Juan Somavia) of an Independent Team of Advisors on positioning the UN development system for the Sustainable Development Goals. In 2018, Energy Community appointed Töpfer to serve"
"Christian Wulff, who was elected President of Germany. Jörg Bode (politician) Jörg Bode (born 12 November 1970 in Celle) is a German politician of the Free Democratic Party, currently serving as the Minister for Economics, Labour and Transport and Deputy Prime Minister of the state of Lower Saxony. He was elected to the Landtag of Lower Saxony in 2003, and has been re-elected on one occasion. On 28 October 2009, Bode succeeded Philipp Rösler as the Minister for Economics, Labour and Transport and Deputy Prime Minister of the State of Lower Saxony. He served as Acting Prime Minister from 30"
"popular also among CDU/CSU and FDP politicians due to his record as an upstanding, moral person during the communist dictatorship as well as his record as a ""Stasi hunter"" in the 1990s. His main contender, Christian Wulff, and politicians of all the government parties, stated that they greatly respected Gauck and his life and work. Jörg Schönbohm, former Chairman of the CDU of Brandenburg, also supported Gauck. The only party that in principle rejected Gauck as a possible president was the legal successor of the East German communist party, Die Linke, which interpreted the nomination of the SPD and Greens"
"majority of seats. The FDP failed to get over 5% of the vote in 2013, denying the party seats in the Bundestag for the first time in its history. In contrast, the CDU/CSU obtained their best result since 1990, with nearly 42% of the vote and just short of 50% of the seats. The CDU/CSU then successfully negotiated with the Social Democrats (SPD) to form a grand coalition for the third time. In March 2017, the SPD chose Martin Schulz, the former President of the European Parliament, as their leader and chancellor candidate. Support for the SPD initially increased; however,"
"possible successor to Graham Watson as leader of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe Group in the parliament, but the post went instead to Guy Verhofstadt. From 2011, Lambsdorff chaired the 12-member German FDP delegation in the European Parliament, before subsequently being elected Leader of the European Liberals and Democrats Group in 2014. Until 2014, Lambsdorff served as member of the European Parliament's Committee on Foreign Affairs and the EU-Delegation for relations with the People's Republic of China. He also served as a deputy on the European Parliament Committee on Culture and Education and on the Delegation to"