Jens Spahn

Spahn became a member of the Junge Union Deutschlands (JU) in 1995, aged 15. He went on to join the CDU in 1997. He was the chair of the Borken district JU from 1999 to 2006. In 2005, he also took up the chair of the Borken district CDU, which numbers 6,500 members.

In December 2014 Spahn unexpectedly stood for a place on the CDU's ruling council against health minister Hermann Gröhe, in a contest widely seen as crystallizing the generational tensions within the party. His election bid was backed by the then 72-year-old finance minister, Wolfgang Schäuble.[5] Shortly before the vote at the annual CDU party conference, Gröhe withdrew his candidacy and Spahn was elected.[6]

He has been mentioned as a possible replacement for Angela Merkel as Chancellor,[7][8] and stood in the CDU leadership campaign in 2018 after Merkel announced that she would not seek re-election as party leader. However, the 157 votes he secured, despite being more than expected, was insufficient for him to qualify for the second round of voting, which was won by Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer.[2]

Spahn has been a member of the Ahaus City Council since 1999.

Spahn first became a member of parliament in the 2002 elections. He has since won three consecutive elections in 2002, 2005 and 2009 in the constituency of Steinfurt I – Borken I. In 2005, he obtained 51.2% of first preference votes. In 27 September 2009 election, Spahn won again with 44.5% of the primary vote, earning a direct mandate.[9]

From November 2005, Spahn served as the vice-chair of the CDU/CSU working group on health policy, while at the same time chair of the CDU–CSU parliamentary group in the Committee of Health. He was also a member of the CDU–CSU–SPD coalition working group, which brought about the 2007 health reform. Since 2009, he has been chair of the working group on health and health policy as well as the spokesman of the CDU–CSU parliamentary group on health policy.

Spahn was a substitute member of the Budget Committee. He is part of the "Young Group" of the CDU–CSU parliamentary group. Spahn co-founded a cross-party group of young MPs pushing for the integration of intergeneration equity as a national objective into Germany's Basic Law.[10]

Between 2005 and 2013, Spahn served as deputy chair of the German–Dutch Parliamentary Friendship Group. Since 2014, he has been its chair.

In negotiations to form a government following the 2013 federal elections, Spahn led the CDU–CSU delegation in the health working group; his co-chair from the SPD was Karl Lauterbach.

In 2015, Spahn became Parliamentary State Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Finance under minister Wolfgang Schäuble in the third cabinet of Chancellor Angela Merkel. At the ministry, he oversaw the German government's annual budget. He was in charge of representing Germany in the negotiations on the annual budget of the European Union.[11]

In the fourth Merkel cabinet, Spahn was appointed Federal Minister of Health in March 2018, succeeding Hermann Gröhe.

In 2019, Spahn visited four countries in sub-Saharan Africa to witness up close the fight against Ebola.[12]

An economic liberal and openly gay Roman Catholic, Spahn has combined a platform of lower taxes and less red tape with support for same-sex marriage.[5] In 2012, he and twelve other CDU/CSU MPs united in their call for defending tax-law equality for couples registered in a civil union.[13] In a public vote in June 2012, he pushed for such legislation as well as to open marriage to same-sex partners, but the bill was denied by his own party and eventually defeated.[14] By 2013, Spahn and others considered signing on to a "group petition," in which they would publicly side with the opposition on expanding the rights of registered same-sex partnerships to include all the tax benefits given to married heterosexual couples.[15] As health minister, he introduced a law in 2019 to ban conversion therapy on under-18s, or coercing, deceiving or threatening anyone older into such treatment. Violators can be punished by up to a year in prison, while advertising or offering conversion therapy carry a fine of up to 30,000 euros.[16]

During the European migrant crisis, Spahn emerged as a vocal critic of Chancellor Angela Merkel's refugee policy, arguing that their party had "perhaps put too much emphasis on the humanitarian approach".[17]

In April 2008, Spahn voiced his opposition to grand coalition plans to increase pensions because such a "gift" to the "medium and long-term retirees" would cost a "lot of money". He particularly criticized the arbitrary intervention of federal labour minister Olaf Scholz in the form of a surprise announcement on pensions formula.[18]

This statement brought him strong criticism, especially from the Senior Citizens Union (Senioren-Union). Spahn received many insults and threats in the form of anonymous letters, inter alia, and complained of this in the media. The Senior Citizens Union announced it would do everything to prevent his re-election, but Spahn received the support of former president of Germany Roman Herzog.[19]

After the 2013 federal elections, Spahn criticized the coalition pact between CDU/CSU and the SPD for making too many concessions to the SPD on lowering the retirement age from 67 to 63 for some workers.[20]

As part of coalition negotiations, Spahn and others succeeded in bringing "core demands for a black and yellow health policy" against the opinion of some like Rolf Koschorrek, in the form of a rearrangement of the Institute for Quality and Efficiency in Health Care (IQWiG). In order to do so, they asked for a "realignment at the top of the house staff". This is because the coalition agreement says that "the work of the IGWiG is checked" and "its decisions are respected". This came at a time when Peter Sawicki, the institute's director, had repeatedly voiced his opposition to the introduction of new medicine. Journalist Markus Grill wrote about "Operation Hippocrates", an alleged plot to replace Sawicki with a more pharmaceutical industry-friendly candidate.[21]

During his time in office, the German government introduced measure to make measles vaccinations mandatory for children and employees of kindergartens and schools.[22]

• Sparkasse Westmünsterland, member of the supervisory board (2009–2015)[23]
• Mosaiques Diagnostics und Therapeutics AG, member of the supervisory board (2010–2012)
• Signal Iduna Pensionskasse AG, member of the supervisory board (2005–2010)
• Barmenia Insurances, member of the advisory board (2005–2008)

• German Forum for Crime Prevention (DFK), ex-officio member of the board of trustees (since 2018)[24]
• World Economic Forum (WEF), member of the Europe Policy Group (since 2017)[25]
• Deutsche AIDS-Stiftung, member of the board of trustees
• Jugend gegen AIDS, member of the advisory board[26]
• Konrad Adenauer Foundation (KAS), member[27]
• FernUniversität Hagen, member of the Parliamentary Advisory Board
• Magnus Hirschfeld Foundation, Member of the board of trustees
• Federal Cultural Foundation, member of the board of trustees
• Atlantik-Brücke, member
• Catholic Workers Movement (KAB), member
• Humanitarian Aid Foundation for Persons infected with HIV through blood products (HIV Foundation), chairman of the board (since 2018)
• German Federal Environmental Foundation (DBU), member of the board of trustees (2015–2018)