Michael Stempfle: ARD journalist praises Pistorius and moves to the Ministry of Defense days later

Michael Stampfle
ARD journalist praises Defense Minister Pistorius – and days later moves to his ministry

The journalist Michael Stempfle is moving from the ARD capital city office as press spokesman to the Federal Ministry of Defence. Some people are upset about this job change that a few days earlier he had praised his future boss on tagesschau.de.

The new Defense Minister Boris Pistorius (SPD) is bringing a new spokesman into the house: ARD journalist Michael Stempfle will be head of the information work department, the ministry announced on Monday in Berlin. Stempfle replaces the former ARD journalist Christian Thiels, who worked as spokesman for both Minister Christine Lambrecht (SPD) and her predecessor Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer (CDU).

However, on January 17, shortly before Pistorius was appointed defense minister, Stempfle had the Lower Saxony on “tagesschau.de” praised as a “full-blooded politician who gets down to business” – “with a keen sense for issues and for pragmatic solutions”. His move to the ministry was announced six days later. This raises questions: When the text was published, did Stempfle already have the offer from the Federal Ministry of Defense? And when did ARD know about the upcoming change? The CDU member of the Bundestag also asks the same thing Matthias Hauer on Twitter: “Recently Boris #Pistorius was enthusiastically acclaimed and @mijoste (Twitter name of Michael Stempfle, ed.) is already his spokesman in the @BMVg_Bundeswehr. #Stempfle will certainly explain to us whether the job offer from the BMVg at the time of the comment already existed!?”

Quick move from ARD to the Ministry of Defence

Under the tweet, other users are also wondering if everything went correctly. It is not unusual for journalists to switch from editorial offices to the press offices of companies, authorities or ministries. Stempfle’s predecessor was also a journalist for ARD before he became press spokesman for the Federal Ministry of Defense. What is unusual in the Stempfle case, however, is the short time between the two activities. For the timing of the star Inquiries addressed to the ARD and the Federal Ministry of Defense, but received no more answers on Monday evening.

The “Tagesschau” has meanwhile written the note under the Stempfle text: “Editor’s note: At the time this text was published (January 17, 2023), Michael Stempfle was a correspondent in the ARD capital studio. It has been known since January 23, 2023, that he will become a spokesman for the Department of Defense.”

with DPA