Since being elected to the post of Bundestag president in March, Julia Klöckner of the conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) has managed to rile up lawmakers from the left-wing end of the political spectrum.

In June, it emerged that she had decided that the rainbow Pride flag would not fly from the parliament building, the Reichstag, on Christopher Street Day on July 26 — reversing a decision made by her predecessor Bärbel Bas of the center-left Social Democratic Party (SPD) in 2022.

Klöckner also decided that queer members of the Bundestag administration were not to attend the CSD parade in an official capacity, something that six members of the SPD described in a letter to the administration as a "wrong and in the current societal situation, sadly also dire signal."

Klöckner dismissed these criticisms in an interview with public broadcaster ARD, in which she pointed out that the Pride flag had been flown from the Bundestag on May 17, the International Day Against Homophobia, Biphobia and Transphobia — as the Bundestag had officially recognized it.

But the Bundestag administration "must remain neutral, however honorable the cause is. That goes for other demonstrations like Fridays for Future or the [anti-abortion and assisted dying demo] March for Life. Even if it sometimes hurts."

Clothing rules

By that time, Klöckner had already shown that she was going to enforce a strict interpretation of the Bundestag's clothing rules. In early June, the president sent lawmaker Cansin Köktürk of the socialist Left Party out of a debate for refusing to remove a T-shirt bearing the word "Palestine," on the grounds that political statements on clothing are not allowed in the chamber (though the T-shirt had no other words on it).

In fact, the only Bundestag regulation about clothing states, rather vaguely, that members' clothing must be "appropriate to the dignity of the chamber." Banners, flyers, and stickers are also banned.

Two weeks earlier, Klöckner sent the Left Party's Marcel Bauer out when he refused to take off his black beret. "I don't want to be the nation's or the MPs' supernanny," she said later, when asked about the incident at a media awards ceremony in Berlin. "But I do think there are a few rules that we have set for ourselves. And that was about if one person was allowed to wear a hat, then the others would come along with steel helmets, and we don't want that," Klöckner explained.

A neutral deputy head of state

A former agriculture minister under Chancellor Angela Merkel, 52-year-old Klöckner has long been a senior politician and a confidante to Chancellor Friedrich Merz. "I have firmly resolved to always fulfill my tasks impartially, calmly and undauntedly, stay clear on the matter, while connecting with others," Klöckner said in her acceptance speech.

Impartiality is certainly a watchword for someone in her office: The president of the Bundestag is formally the second head of the German state (after the president and ahead of the chancellor). And, though there is no regulation stipulating this, the office is traditionally held by someone from the largest parliamentary group — in this case, the CDU/CSU.

Dealing with the growing AfD

Dealing with the rising popularity of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD), poses a challenge to parliamentary neutrality.
 
Though it is now the second biggest in the Bundestag, the other parties have so far refused to elect an AfD member as one of Klöckner's deputies.

Klöckner herself has also been at the center of the debate on how the CDU should cope with the rising popularity of the AfD. 

In the run-up to February's federal election, she caused a stir by posting a combative statement on Instagram: "You don't have to vote AfD for what you want. There is a democratic alternative: The CDU." This was seen by critics as both a trivialization of the AfD and a tacit admission that the CDU had adopted the far-right party's extreme anti-refugee stance.

The post was later deleted and replaced with one including a clarifying statement: "The concerns that many believe they can achieve by voting for the AfD, such as greater security or clear action against illegal migration, cannot be achieved with the AfD, but only with the CDU on the basis of the Basic Law."

It was not the first time that Klöckner had taken a hard line on immigration policy: In 2015, when refugees came to Germany in large numbers from Syria, Afghanistan and Iraq, Klöckner demanded that they be legally obliged to integrate into society. In 2023, she also reposted a false claim on social media that dental care for asylum-seekers had cost the German state €690 million ($746 million) in the previous year. That post is still on her X account.

Criticizing the church

Some of Klöckner's statements have also annoyed Germany's Christian leaders: In an interview with the Bild am Sonntag newspaper in April, she said churches had developed too much of a tendency to comment on day-to-day politics "like an NGO" rather than focus on "the basic questions of life and death."

"I mean, sure, the church can express its opinion on the speed limit, but that's not necessarily why I pay church tax," she said.

She reaped plenty of criticism for the interview: The Catholic archbishop of Paderborn, Udo Markus Bentz, told the outlet Herder Korrespondenz: "I will not allow anyone to muzzle me, regardless of the issue."

The interview also earned Klöckner a rebuke from her own party's former leader, Armin Laschet. "The church has always been political," he told public broadcaster Phoenix. "Anyone who derives from the Christian message that one should change the world for the better, that one should shape the world, is always sending a political message."

Klöckner, who once studied Catholic theology, responded to the criticism by clarifying: "I didn't say that the church shouldn't interfere," she said. "I said that the Church has such relevance that it must go beyond traffic rules."

A not-always-straightforward career path

Klöckner is the daughter of a winegrower from the western state of Rhineland-Palatinate. Among her prestigious early roles was as German Wine Queen in 1995, an office that involves more than 200 public appointments a year.

Trained as a journalist, Klöckner led the CDU in her home state from 2010 to 2022, during which time she spent four years, from 2018 to 2021, as federal agriculture minister.

In that role too, Klöckner occasionally attracted controversy. Environmental organizations criticized Klöckner for what they saw as a closeness to the food processing corporations.

 In 2019, she was accused of openly advertising for the international food processing giant by posting a video on social media in which she appeared beside Nestle's Germany chief and praised it for reducing the amount of sugar in its food — campaigners have long called on Germany to introduce a sugar tax.

The Bundestag president's job

The president chairs the Bundestag's plenary sessions and supervises the laws governing the parliament. He or she also represents the parliament as a whole, speaking at commemorative ceremonies and sometimes also during state visits by foreign heads of government or heads of state.

Klöckner's occasionally polarizing political style made some observers wonder whether she was the right person for the post of Bundestag president, an office that is often held by someone with extensive parliamentary experience held in high regard by all parliamentary parties — in some cases politicians coming towards the end of their political careers.

This was particularly the case with Wolfgang Schäuble, the last CDU politician to hold the post, which involves representing the parliament as a whole, and speaking at commemorative ceremonies such as the one held every year on January 27 to mark the Holocaust.

A veteran of several Cabinet posts, Schäuble was Bundestag president from 2017 to 2021, when he was well into his 70s. Klöckner, by comparison, is a much younger, and some would say a more divisive figure.

Edited by: Rina Goldenberg

This text was modified following publication to add additional background and context.

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