The leaders of Germany’s governing conservatives wasted no time: Just a few days after Jens Spahn resigned as parliamentary group leader following a scandal over surrogacy, the Christian Democratic Union (CDU) named its candidate to succeed him: Thorsten Frei.
The 52-year-old, currently serving as head of the chancellery and considered a close confidant of Chancellor Friedrich Merz, is now set take over one of the most important positions in German politics, leading the Bundestag members of both the CDU and its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU).
Frei can only officially take office once he has been elected by the 208 CDU and CSU lawmakers, who are scheduled to interrupt their summer recess on July 29 to convene a special session in the Bundestag. Frei’s successor at the chancellery is also expected to have been named by then.
Working behind the scenes wasn’t Frei’s strength
Friendly, likable, approachable, and a good mediator — that’s how Thorsten Frei is often described in Berlin’s political circles.
A trained lawyer, he has been married to a teacher for 20 years and has three children. He lives in the city of Donaueschingen in the southwestern state of Baden-Württemberg in the Black Forest, where he was a mayor for nine years before entering federal politics.
At the chancellery, Frei’s job was essentially to cover Merz’s back, a kind of first officer to the ship’s captain, responsible for ensuring that the chancellor’s affairs ran smoothly and that obstacles were cleared out of the way.
It was a role that, some critics have said, did not really suit Frei, who was sometimes accused of preferring to give interviews himself rather than quietly coordinate the chancellor’s appointments.
Back in the spotlight
As parliamentary group leader, Frei will be freer to take center stage. One task will be to explain his party’s positions in speeches in the Bundestag and interviews with the media. Above all, he will have to secure majorities for the government’s policies and ensure that the members of his parliamentary group are as united as possible.
This will not be easy. After the current government took office in May last year, outgoing group leader Jens Spahn sometimes struggled to maintain the government’s 18-seat majority.
The parliamentary group leader also has to negotiate with the conservatives’ coalition partner, the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD), something that Spahn was seen to be good at.
In short: The chancellor governs, while the parliamentary group leader ensures there is political support.
When the CDU/CSU was in opposition from 2021 to 2025, Frei held the office of parliamentary secretary of the group, an administrative task that involves overseeing day-to-day coordination of the parliament’s agenda, organizing committees, and ensuring that group members are present for important votes. He worked closely with Merz, who was then the leader of the opposition and parliamentary group leader.
After the February 2025 election, Frei reportedly coveted the group leader job, but had to make way for the more famous Spahn, a former health minister under Angela Merkel.
A case of double standards
Spahn had been in office for about 14 months when he resigned last Saturday (July 18). He and his husband, Daniel Funke, had just announced that they had become parents with the help of a surrogate mother in the United States. However, surrogacy is prohibited in Germany, and the CDU is a party that has repeatedly voted to support this ban.
Spahn was accused of hypocrisy. By bypassing a law that some saw as a cornerstone of his party’s moral values, Spahn was seen as having created a credibility problem not only for himself but also for his party.
The Social Democrats are satisfied
The nomination of Frei as Spahn’s successor has been met with approval by the coalition partner, the SPD. “I have worked very well with Thorsten Frei in the past,” said Dirk Wiese, parliamentary secretary of the SPD parliamentary group in the Bundestag, in Berlin. “We were both deputy parliamentary group leaders for domestic and legal policy in the last grand coalition, and I got to know him there as a very knowledgeable colleague who is easy to negotiate with and who always has a very detailed grasp of the issues.”
Wiese said he looked forward to working with him in the future, once the CDU/CSU leadership bodies have given their approval.
This article has been translated from German.
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