Kühnert resigned as general secretary of the SPD on Monday for health reasons.
A few hours later, Kevin Könnert’s successor was decided: energy and climate politician Matthias Miersch will be the SPD’s new general secretary. Like Kohnert, he is considered to be on the party’s left. Kohnert resigned for health reasons on Monday, a good year before the German federal election.
The 35-year-old wrote that his office needed energy and campaigning to stay healthy for the foreseeable future. According to the German Press Agency, these are not physical problems, but mental problems. “That’s why I make decisions,” Kohnert explained. He will not run for the German Bundestag again. It’s a blow for the German Social Democrats: They’re losing their campaign manager at a strategically important juncture — and one of their greatest political talents at the moment.
The move did not come as a surprise to the party. The party committees meeting that evening agreed to the party leaders’ proposal: Miersch, one of the Bundestag division’s vice-presidents, should temporarily assume the post of general secretary. Lower Saxony could be officially elected at the party conference in the summer, where the SPD wants to choose its candidate for chancellor.
An advocate of energy transition
With Matthias Miersch as the new SPD general secretary, the left wing of the German Social Democrats has a new representative in a key position. The 55-year-old lawyer from Hanover is not only the deputy chairman of the Bundestag parliamentary committee, but also the spokesperson of the so-called parliamentary left since 2015. In parliamentary work, the lawyer is considered well-informed and experienced.
For example, he played a key role in advancing the government draft in the debate on the controversial Heat Act. In recent months, Miersch has been repeatedly discussed as a possible successor to SPD parliamentary group leader Rolf Mützenich.
Miersch was probably chosen because he is considered an experienced expert in the fields of energy, industry, climate and economic policy. This is considered important given the expected election campaign clash with the CDU/CSU and the Greens in these sectors.
Not an easy task
Miersch’s task was to quickly organize the SPD’s federal election campaign. His predecessor Kevin Konert, who resigned on Monday – like SPD co-chair Saskia Esken, also the party’s left wing representative – spoke of the difficult task of rebuilding the party through the federal election given the low polls. and “low self-esteem”. The aim is for the party to become a strong force again – even if the Union now has double the recognition. According to party sources, Miersch, who has been a member of the party’s executive committee since 2013, should make the SPD more campaignable. Miersch, who began his political career as a local politician, entered the Bundestag with a direct mandate from 2005 and won his Hanover-Land II constituency in 2021 with 40.7 percent.
Like Kühnert, Miersch is not necessarily considered a fan of Chancellor Olaf Scholz, but is likely to confront him with the party’s demands that Scholz show a strong social democratic character. As a parliamentary committee deputy, Miersch repeatedly called on the chancellor — albeit in vain — to impose industrial electricity rates on traffic lights to free companies from high electricity costs. Like his party, Miersch is a staunch advocate of reforming the debt ceiling to enable greater investment in infrastructure.
With Miersch, the strong presence of politicians from Lower Saxony in the SPD at the federal level is further strengthened. Labor Minister Hubertus Heil and Defense Minister Boris Pistorius are also from Lower Saxony – as is SPD co-leader Lars Klingbeil.
Anyone can interfere during the election campaign
However, Lower Saxony is unlikely to take on all of Kohnert’s outgoing general secretary – or at least not alone. There are indications that party leader Lars Klingbeil is helping to organize the election campaign. Because he was the leader of the successful election campaign before the last federal election. “It’s my firm belief that you can organize success,” Klingbeil said. This suggests that he himself can take a more active role in strategic planning.
The new leadership of the Social Democrats could mean further turmoil for the traffic light coalition formed by the SPD, the Greens and the FDP. Because not only the SPD, but the Greens and the entire board will have to reinvent themselves after the withdrawal.
Outgoing Green Party leader Omit Nuripour wished Kohnert a full recovery on behalf of his party and thanked him for his “faithful cooperation” over the past three years. Unlike the Greens, Kohnert’s decision had nothing to do with poor electoral results – even if he was criticized after the SPD’s defeat in the European elections.
Not an easy role
Kühnert’s role in the SPD cannot be easily accepted. The young Berliner became general secretary of the Social Democratic Party from 2021 and entered the Bundestag in the same year. Before that, he was considered the main troublemaker of the SPD for many years. He was the face of the No-GroKo campaign in 2018 and wanted to prevent a government with the Union and the SPD as Juso boss. In the SPD leadership election in 2019, he supported the left-wing duo Esken and his rival Norbert Walter-Borjans – who won together. Kohnert was later elected party vice-chairman.
He has remained steadfast in his opinion ever since. Kühnert has recently appeared on several talk shows for the SPD, but has expressed himself very carefully there, and swallowed a lot for his party’s success. “He made a decisive contribution to ensuring stability in the SPD, and he made a decisive contribution to the further development of our party in recent years,” Klingbeil stressed.
