Former Bundestag President Wolfgang Schäuble is dead. The CDU politician fell asleep peacefully at home with his family on Tuesday evening around 8 p.m., the family told the German Press Agency.
Schäuble was born on September 18, 1942 in Freiburg. He studied law, but was drawn to politics early on. He joined the CDU in 1965. In his long political career, Schäuble was a minister, CDU leader, parliamentary group leader and President of the German Bundestag. Nobody has been a member of Parliament longer than him. Schäuble sat in the German Bundestag for more than half a century. Since 1972 he has always won his constituency in Offenburg, Baden, directly. He served in Parliament without interruption until his death. Just a few weeks ago he could be seen in the corridors of the Reichstag building.
Schäuble achieved his best first vote result in 1990 – directly after reunification.
(Photo: SZ-Grafik)
Decades of German politics are associated with the name Schäuble. Under Chancellor Helmut Kohl (CDU), he was initially head of the Federal Chancellery and Federal Minister for Special Tasks, and from 1989 to 1991 Federal Minister of the Interior. Schäuble helped negotiate the unification treaty in the GDR after the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Behind the scenes, his word always carried weight
After an assassination attempt on him by a mentally disturbed man in October 1990, Schäuble was in a wheelchair, but his political career continued. From 1991 to 2000 he led the CDU/CSU parliamentary group. After the Union lost power in 1998, Schäuble became party leader as part of the CDU’s realignment. Angela Merkel became Secretary General.
In the turmoil of the CDU donations affair and after statements about a 100,000 mark cash donation, Schäuble resigned as CDU leader in February 2000. Merkel became party leader and made him interior minister as chancellor in 2005, and finance minister four years later. Schäuble held the office for two electoral terms; he achieved the “black zero”, i.e. a federal budget without new debts.
After the 2017 federal election, Schäuble was elected President of the Bundestag, the second highest office in the state, as the successor to Norbert Lammert. Schäuble was denied the highest office in the state, that of Federal President.
After the 2021 federal election, which the Union lost, Schäuble withdrew from the leadership committees. In the Bundestag, the SPD politician Bärbel Bas became president, and Schäuble was now a member of parliament. As senior president – the MP with the most years of service – he promoted open discourse and self-confident MPs.
Schäuble was one of the conservative politicians in his party, and behind the scenes his words always carried weight. Nevertheless, he called on the CDU earlier than others to be open to alliances with the Greens. Already in 2007 he said Frankfurter Allgemeine Sunday newspaper: “Black-green is not our wish, but it is an option for the Union.” In the struggle for the 2021 candidacy for chancellor, Schäuble sided with the then CDU leader Armin Laschet and opposed CSU leader Markus Söder.
Politics also often played a role in Schäuble’s private life. Father Karl Schäuble was already a CDU politician and a member of the Baden state parliament. Schäuble’s younger brother Thomas was also a politician. He was state minister in Baden-Württemberg for 13 years. He died in 2013 as a result of a heart attack. The top CDU politician Thomas Strobl was Wolfgang Schäuble’s son-in-law, daughter Christine, the ARD program director, and Strobl’s wife. Schäuble leaves behind a total of four children and his wife Ingeborg, to whom he was married since 1969.