Thomas Heilmann (born 16 July 1964) is a German politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU). Born in

Dortmund Dortmund (; ; ) is the third-largest city in North Rhine-Westphalia, after Cologne and Düsseldorf, and the List of cities in Germany by population, ninth-largest city in Germany. With a population of 614,495 inhabitants, it is the largest city ...

North Rhine-Westphalia North Rhine-Westphalia or North-Rhine/Westphalia, commonly shortened to NRW, is a States of Germany, state () in Old states of Germany, Western Germany. With more than 18 million inhabitants, it is the List of German states by population, most ...

, he has served as a member of the

Bundestag The Bundestag (, "Federal Diet (assembly), Diet") is the lower house of the Germany, German Federalism in Germany, federal parliament. It is the only constitutional body of the federation directly elected by the German people. The Bundestag wa ...

from the state of

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

since 2017.

Career in the private sector

From 2001 until 2008, Heilmann was a partner and CEO of

Scholz & Friends Scholz & Friends is one of Europe's largest advertising agencies. The company was founded in Hamburg by Jürgen Scholz, Uwe Lang and Michael Menzel in 1981. Today, the company has dual headquarters in Hamburg-HafenCity and Berlin-Mitte. Scholz & ...

. In 2001, he was nominated to join the supervisory board of

Axel Springer SE Axel Springer SE () is a European multinational corporation, multinational mass media, mass and online media company, based in Berlin, Germany. The company offers printing and publishing of advertisements, digital classifieds portfolio, marketi ...

; however, he was replaced by Axel Sven Springer before the vote. At the request of Federal Minister of Labour and Social Affairs

Ursula von der Leyen Ursula Gertrud von der Leyen (; ; born 8 October 1958) is a German politician, serving as president of the European Commission since 2019. She served in the Cabinet of Germany, German federal government between 2005 and 2019, holding position ...

, Heilmann negotiated a high-profile agreement between investor

Nicolas Berggruen Nicolas Berggruen (; born 10 August 1961) is a US-based billionaire investor and philanthropist. Born in Paris, France, he is a dual German and American citizen. He is the founder and president of Berggruen Holdings, a private investment company ...

and other shareholders on the sale of embattled department house chain

Karstadt Karstadt Warenhaus GmbH was a German department store chain whose headquarters were in Essen. Until 30 September 2010 the company was a subsidiary of Arcandor, Arcandor AG (which was known until 30 June 2007 as KarstadtQuelle AG) and was respo ...

in 2010. From 2011 until 2012, Heilmann briefly served as chair of the board at

Save the Children The Save the Children Fund, commonly known as Save the Children, is an international non-governmental organization. It was founded in the UK in 1919; its goal is to improve the lives of children worldwide. The organization raises money to imp ...

Germany.

Political career

Career in state government

From 2012 until 2016, Heilmann served as State Minister of Justice and Consumer Protection in the

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 ...

s of successive Governing Mayors of Berlin

Klaus Wowereit Klaus Wowereit (born 1 October 1953) is a German politician of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) and was the Governing Mayor of Berlin from 21 October 2001 to 11 December 2014. In 2001 state elections his party won a plurality of the votes, 29 ...

(2012–2014) and Michael Müller (2014–2016). In 2012, Heilmann – together fellow state ministers Mario Czaja and Frank Henkel – unsuccessfully advocated for a reduction in the penalty-free personal use of cannabis from 15 to six grams. In the negotiations to form a ''

Grand Coalition A grand coalition is an arrangement in a multi-party parliamentary system in which the two largest political party, political parties of opposing political spectrum, political ideologies unite in a coalition government. Causes of a grand coali ...

'' 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 ...

's Christian Democrats ( CDU together with the Bavarian

CSU CSU may refer to: Universities and university systems United States * Columbia Southern University, in Orange Beach, Alabama * California State University system * Colorado State University, in Fort Collins, Colorado * Connecticut State Univers ...

) and the

Social Democrats Social democracy is a social, economic, and political philosophy within socialism that supports political and economic democracy and a gradualist, reformist, and democratic approach toward achieving social equality. In modern practice, s ...

(SPD) following the 2013 German elections, Heilmann was part of the CDU/CSU delegation in the working group on digital policy, led by Dorothee Bär and Brigitte Zypries. In the 2016 state elections, Heilmann unsuccessfully ran for a seat in the State Parliament.

Member of the German Parliament, 2017–present

Heilmann became a member of the Bundestag in the

2017 German federal election The 2017 German federal election was held in Germany on 24 September 2017 to elect the List of members of the 19th Bundestag, members of the 19th Bundestag. At stake were at least 598 seats in the Bundestag, as well as 111 Overhang seat, overhan ...

, representing Berlin's

Steglitz-Zehlendorf Steglitz-Zehlendorf () is the sixth Boroughs of Berlin, borough of Berlin, formed in Berlin's 2001 administrative reform by merging the former boroughs of Steglitz and Zehlendorf, Berlin, Zehlendorf. Home to the Free University of Berlin, the Be ...

district. In parliament, he has served on the Committee on Labour and Social Affairs (2018–2021), the Committee on the Digital Agenda (2018–2021) and the Committee on Economic Affairs and Climate Action (since 2021). In his first term, he was his parliamentary group's

rapporteur A rapporteur is a person who is appointed by an organization to report on the proceedings of its meetings. The term is a French-derived word. For example, Dick Marty was appointed ''rapporteur'' by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Eur ...

blockchain The blockchain is a distributed ledger with growing lists of Record (computer science), records (''blocks'') that are securely linked together via Cryptographic hash function, cryptographic hashes. Each block contains a cryptographic hash of th ...

. Within the CDU/CSU parliamentary group, Heilmann has been leading the group of CDU parliamentarians from Berlin since 2021. In the negotiations to form a

between the CDU and the

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties Form ...

(SPD) under the leadership of

Kai Wegner Kai Wegner (born 15 September 1972) is a German politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) who has been serving as Governing Mayor of Berlin since April 2023. He served as a member of the Bundestag, the German federal parliament, from 2 ...

following Berlin's 2023 state elections, Heilmann was part of his party's delegation to the working group on mobility, climate action and environmental protection. In July 2023, Heilmann made news headlines when the

Federal Constitutional Court The Federal Constitutional Court ( ; abbreviated: ) is the supreme constitutional court for the Federal Republic of Germany, established by the constitution or Basic Law () of Germany. Since its inception with the beginning of the post-W ...

issued an injunction blocking parliament from considering a plan submitted by the government of

Olaf Scholz Olaf Scholz (; born 14 June 1958) is a German politician who served as the Chancellor of Germany from 2021 to 2025. A member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany, Social Democratic Party (SPD), he previously served as Vice-Chancellor of Ge ...

to encourage home owners to replace fossil fuel heating systems with cleaner alternatives. This way, the court ruled in favor of Heilmann’s emergency petition in which he had argued that his rights as a lawmaker would be violated by it being pushed through without an opportunity for more detailed consideration.

Other activities

Government agencies

Federal Network Agency The Federal Network Agency ( or ) is the German regulatory office for electricity, gas, telecommunications, post and railway markets. It is a federal agency of the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action and headquartered in Bo ...

for Electricity, Gas, Telecommunications, Post and Railway (BNetzA), Alternate Member of the advisory board (since 2022)

Corporate boards

* BwConsulting, Member of the advisory board (since 2017) *

, Member of the supervisory board (2008–2010) *

Cision Cision Ltd. is a public relations and earned media software company and services provider. The company is incorporated in the Cayman Islands and headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. Cision offers a portfolio of services including PRNewswire, PRW ...

, Member of the Board of Directors (2007–2012) *

Deutsche Bank Deutsche Bank AG (, ) is a Germany, German multinational Investment banking, investment bank and financial services company headquartered in Frankfurt, Germany, and dual-listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange and the New York Stock Exchange. ...

, Member of the advisory board (2003–2010)

Non-profit organizations

Germany, Member of the supervisory board (since 2016) * betterplace.org, Member of the Advisory Board * Museum Berggruen, Member of the International Council *

International, Member of the Board of Trustees (2016–2018) *

Berlin School of Economics and Law The Berlin School of Economics and Law (German: ''Hochschule für Wirtschaft und Recht''), abbreviated as BSEL, is a public institution of higher education and research founded on 1 April 2009 through the merger of the Berlin School of Economic ...

(HWR), Member of the Board of Trustees

Political positions

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 2018, Heilmann publicly endorsed

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 ...

to succeed

as the party's chair. In January 2025, Heilmann was one of 12 CDU lawmakers who opted not to back a draft law on tightening immigration policy sponsored by their own leader

Friedrich Merz Joachim-Friedrich Martin Josef Merz (; ; born 11November 1955) is a German politician serving as Chancellor of Germany since 6 May 2025. He has also served as Leader of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) since January 2022, leading the CDU/CSU ...

, who had pushed for the law despite warnings from party colleagues that he risked being tarnished with the charge of voting alongside the far-right

Alternative for Germany Alternative for Germany (, AfD, ) is a Far-right politics in Germany (1945–present), far-right,Far-right: * * * * * * * * * * * * * * Right-wing populism, right-wing populist and National conservatism, national-conservative p ...

.Helen Bielawa, Marcel Pauly and Rina Wilkin (1 February 2025)
Zustrombegrenzungsgesetz: So haben die einzelnen Abgeordneten abgestimmt
''

Der Spiegel (, , stylized in all caps) is a German weekly news magazine published in Hamburg. With a weekly circulation of about 724,000 copies in 2022, it is one of the largest such publications in Europe. It was founded in 1947 by John Seymour Chaloner ...

''.

References

External links

*
Bundestag biography
{{DEFAULTSORT:Heilmann, Thomas 1964 births Living people Members of the Bundestag for Berlin Members of the Bundestag 2021–2025 Members of the Bundestag 2017–2021 Members of the Bundestag for the Christian Democratic Union of Germany People from Dortmund