Bernd Althusmann (; born 3 December 1966) is a German politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) who served as Deputy Minister-President and State Minister for Economic Affairs in the government of Minister-President

Stephan Weil Stephan Weil (born 15 December 1958) is a German politician and the leader of the Social Democratic Party in Lower Saxony. On 20 January 2013, the SPD and the Green party won the 2013 Lower Saxony state election by one seat. On 19 February 20 ...

from 2017 to 2022.

Career

From 1994 to 2009, Althusmann was Member of the

Landtag of Lower Saxony The Lower Saxon Landtag () or the Parliament of Lower Saxony is the state diet of the German state of Lower Saxony. It convenes in Hanover and currently consists of 146 members, consisting of four parties. Since 2022 the majority is a coalition ...

. He served as State Minister of Education in the cabinets Wulff II and McAllister from 27 April 2010 until 19 February 2013. In July 2011 it was reported that Althusmann had taken over texts or literal texts in several places in his dissertation. The University of Potsdam has not confirmed the plagiarism allegations, despite deficiencies. Between 2013 and 2016, Althusmann headed the

Konrad Adenauer Foundation The Konrad Adenauer Foundation ('' German: Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung e.V.; Abbreviation: KAS'') is a German political party foundation associated with but independent of the centre-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU). The foundation's head ...

's office in

Windhoek Windhoek (; ; ) is the capital and largest city of Namibia. It is located in central Namibia in the Khomas Highland plateau area, at around above sea level, almost exactly at the country's geographical centre. The population of Windhoek, which ...

Namibia Namibia, officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country on the west coast of Southern Africa. Its borders include the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Angola and Zambia to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south; in the no ...

. Althusmann was the CDU's leading candidate for the 2017 Lower Saxon state election. On the national level, Althusmann served as a CDU delegate to the Federal Convention for the purpose of electing the

President of Germany The president of Germany, officially titled the Federal President of the Federal Republic of Germany (),The official title within Germany is ', with ' being added in international correspondence; the official English title is President of the F ...

in 2010, 2012,

2017 2017 was designated as the International Year of Sustainable Tourism for Development by the United Nations General Assembly. Events January * January 1 – Istanbul nightclub shooting: A gunman dressed as Santa Claus opens fire at the ...

and

2022 The year began with another wave in the COVID-19 pandemic, with SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant, Omicron spreading rapidly and becoming the dominant variant of the SARS-CoV-2 virus worldwide. Tracking a decrease in cases and deaths, 2022 saw ...

. In the negotiations to form a

coalition government A coalition government, or coalition cabinet, is a government by political parties that enter into a power-sharing arrangement of the executive. Coalition governments usually occur when no single party has achieved an absolute majority after an ...

under the leadership of

Chancellor Chancellor () is a title of various official positions in the governments of many countries. The original chancellors were the of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the (lattice work screens) of a basilica (court hall), which separa ...

Angela Merkel Angela Dorothea Merkel (; ; born 17 July 1954) is a German retired politician who served as Chancellor of Germany from 2005 to 2021. She is the only woman to have held the office. She was Leader of the Opposition from 2002 to 2005 and Leade ...

following the 2017 federal elections, he co-chaired the working group on urban development; his counterparts were

Kurt Gribl Kurt Gribl (born 29 August 1964 Augsburg, Germany) is a former List of mayors of Augsburg, Mayor of Augsburg, Bavaria, an office he held from 1 May 2008 to 30 April 2020. He is a member of the Christian Social Union of Bavaria. Early career Gribl ...

and Natascha Kohnen. Together with

Monika Grütters Monika Grütters (born 9 January 1962) is a German politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) who served as Federal Government Commissioner for Culture and the Media (Staatsministerin für Kultur und Medien) in the government of Chancel ...

Daniel Günther Daniel Günther (born 24 July 1973) is a German politician who is a member of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU). Since 28 June 2017, he has served as the Minister President of Schleswig-Holstein. From 1 November 2018 to 31 Octobe ...

Michael Kretschmer Michael Kretschmer (born 7 May 1975) is a German politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) who has been serving as Minister President of Saxony since December 2017. Since 2022, he has been one of four deputy chairs of the CDU, under th ...

and

Armin Laschet Armin Laschet (; born 18 February 1961) is a German politician who served as Minister President of North Rhine-Westphalia from 27 June 2017 to 26 October 2021. He served as Leader of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) from 22 January 2021 t ...

, Althusmann co-chaired the CDU’s national convention in Berlin in February 2018. Since 2022, Althusmann has been chairing – alongside Gitta Connemann – a working group charged with drafting the CDU’s positions on energy policy.

Other activities

Regulatory agencies

* Federal Network Agency for Electricity, Gas, Telecommunications, Post and Railway (BNetzA), Alternate Member of the Advisory Board

Corporate boards

Volkswagen Volkswagen (VW; )English: , . is a German automotive industry, automobile manufacturer based in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. Established in 1937 by German Labour Front, The German Labour Front, it was revitalized into the global brand it ...

, Ex-Officio Member of the Supervisory Board (since 2017) * Deutsche Messe AG, Ex-Officio Chairman of the Supervisory Board (since 2017) * JadeWeserPort, Ex-Officio Chairman of the Supervisory Board (since 2017) * Niedersachsen Ports GmbH & Co. KG (NPorts), Ex-Officio Chairman of the Supervisory Board (since 2017)

Political positions

During his election campaign, Althusmann publicly favored someone from outside the auto industry to succeed VW chief executive Matthias Müller and wanted to cede one of the state’s two board seats to a non-political expert. But when his party lost the 2017 state elections to the SPD, he claimed the economy minister’s right to join VW’s supervisory board alongside Minister-President Weil. Ahead of the Christian Democrats’

leadership election A leadership election is a political contest held in various countries by which the members of a political party determine who will be the leader of their party. Generally, any political party can determine its own rules governing how and when a ...

in 2021, Althusmann publicly endorsed

to succeed

Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer (; Kramp; born 9 August 1962), sometimes referred to by her initials of AKK, is a retired German politician who served as Federal Ministry of Defence (Germany), Minister of Defence from 2019 to 2021 and as Leader of th ...

as the party’s chair. For the 2021 national elections, he later also endorsed Laschet as the Christian Democrats' joint candidate to succeed

.Kristina Dunz (April 13, 2021)
Althusmann fordert Laschet und Söder zu schneller Lösung auf
''

RedaktionsNetzwerk Deutschland The (RND) () is the Hanover-based joint corporate newsroom A newsroom is the central place where journalists—reporters, editing, editors, and Television producer, producers, associate producers, news anchors, news designers, photojournal ...

''.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Althusmann, Bernd Ministers of the Lower Saxony State Government 1966 births Christian Democratic Union of Germany politicians Living people People from Oldenburg (city)