Thomas Kemmerich

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Thomas Kemmerich (2020)

Thomas Karl Leonard Kemmerich (also Thomas L. Kemmerich ; born February 20, 1965 in Aachen ) is a German politician ( FDP ) and was the sixth Prime Minister of the Free State of Thuringia from February 5 to March 4, 2020 .

His election as Prime Minister with votes from AfD , CDU and FDP triggered the government crisis in Thuringia in 2020 . The process was often viewed by the public as “ breaking a taboo ” and as the first cooperation between bourgeois parties and right-wing extremists since the Weimar Republic . On the following day, Kemmerich advocated early elections for the state parliament and announced his withdrawal. Another two days later he officially resigned and held the office until the election of his successor Bodo Ramelow .

Kemmerich has been state chairman of the FDP Thuringia since 2015 and chairman of the FDP parliamentary group, one of the two smallest parliamentary groups in the Thuringian state parliament, since 2019 . Before that he was a member of the Thuringian State Parliament from 2009 to 2014 and a member of the German Bundestag from 2017 to 2019 . He is considered a representative of a right-wing and national liberal movement in the FDP.

education

In 1984 Kemmerich passed the Abitur at the Pius-Gymnasium in Aachen and completed an apprenticeship in wholesale and retail by 1989 . At the same time he studied law at the University of Bonn and also graduated in 1989 with the first state examination.

Professional career

Kemmerich in 2011

After the political change , Kemmerich came to Erfurt and started his own business as a management consultant there in January 1990 together with a college friend . He advised farms and businesses in the trade.

From 1991 onwards, Kemmerich converted the service combine business unit “Hairdressing & Cosmetics” and the production cooperative (PGH) of the hairdressing trade from Weimar , Rudolstadt , Auerbach and Sömmerda to Friseur Masson GmbH . In 2000 the company was transformed into Friseur Masson AG , of which Kemmerich became CEO.

Since December 2017, Kemmerich has been one of two managing partners of Uhrenwerk Weimar GmbH, a trademark that emerged from VEB Uhrenwerk Weimar, which was dissolved in 1990 .

According to the state constitution, minister-presidents in Thuringia are not allowed to belong to the management or to the supervisory body of a company aimed at acquisition without the consent of the state parliament. After taking up his post as Prime Minister Kemmerich resigned from the clock factory in Weimar, according to the spokesman for the Thuringian FDP parliamentary group. However, he is still Chairman of the Management Board of Friseur Masson AG without the required consent of the state parliament . He will retain this position until a successor is elected by the shareholders' meeting.

politics

Kemmerich with Rainer Brüderle during the federal election campaign (2013)

The local elections in Thuringia in 2006, in which SPD applicants were elected mayors in several Thuringian cities (including Andreas Bausewein in Erfurt), Kemmerich later named as the trigger for his own political commitment. He founded a Thuringian regional association of the FDP-affiliated association Liberal Mittelstand and initially became its regional chairman; since November 2011 he has been the chairman of the association. In 2006 he joined the FDP, since 2007 he has been the FDP district chairman in the Thuringian capital of Erfurt. In the local elections in Thuringia in 2009 , he led the party back to the Erfurt city council and became its parliamentary group chairman.

In the state elections in 2009 , he also moved into the state parliament via third place on the FDP state list, where he accompanied the “Economy, Labor, Technology” department as an economic policy spokesman. In the Mayor election in Erfurt on April 22, 2012, Kemmerich ran as an FDP candidate. With 2.6% of the votes, he received the fewest votes of all seven candidates.

In the state elections in Thuringia in 2014 , the FDP resigned from the state parliament, which meant that Kemmerich, who ran at number 4 on the FDP state list, also lost his mandate. He was still a member of the Erfurt city council, where he was a member of a joint faction of the FDP, Free Voters and Pirates . In the Erfurt City Council, newly elected in 2019, he is parliamentary group chairman of the three-member FDP parliamentary group. On June 11, 2020 it became known that Kemmerich would lose his mandate for the Erfurt city council due to a court decision. Kemmerich announced that he would appeal. At N-tv it was said: “The competent chamber of the Weimar Administrative Court could not convince itself that Kemmerich had 'his main focus of residence' at the time of the election in Erfurt, said the President of the Administrative Court, Elke Heßelmann, in Weimar. This means that the family's place of residence is Kemmerich's main residence - this has been Weimar since 2009. Only those who have their main residence there can stand for election as city councilor in a city. "

After Franka Hitzing's resignation as FDP state chairman, Kemmerich was elected her successor on November 29, 2015 at a special party conference in Stadtroda with 85 out of 143 valid votes (59 percent).

For the 2017 federal election , Kemmerich stood as an FDP candidate in the Erfurt - Weimar - Weimarer Land II constituency and as a top candidate on the FDP state list in Thuringia and was elected to the 19th German Bundestag . There he was a member of the Committee on Economic Affairs and Energy and the subcommittee on regional economic policy and ERP business plans as well as a deputy member of the Committee on Food and Agriculture .

Thomas Kemmerich on the evening of the 2019 state election

In November 2018 in Weimar he was elected the top candidate of the FDP Thuringia for the 2019 state election. In the state elections, the FDP achieved, according to the preliminary final result, with 55,422 votes, a share of the vote of 5.0005% and thus returned to the state parliament. On November 7, 2019, the entry into the state parliament was confirmed by the state returning officer with the official final result, and 73 votes were ultimately decisive. Here Kemmerich was elected chairman of the parliamentary group by the five-member FDP parliamentary group. Kemmerich resigned his Bundestag mandate on November 14, 2019, with Reginald Hanke succeeding him .

Prime Minister of the Free State of Thuringia

On February 5, 2020, the members of the Thuringian State Parliament elected Thomas Kemmerich as Thuringian Prime Minister in the third ballot, in which only a relative majority was necessary.

In the election for the Thuringian Prime Minister on February 5, 2020, Thomas Kemmerich ran for the office of Thuringian Prime Minister in the third ballot . In the two previous ballots, neither the managing incumbent Bodo Ramelow ( Die Linke ) nor Christoph Kindervater (set up by the AfD) had an absolute majority.

In the decisive third ballot, Kemmerich received exactly one vote more than Bodo Ramelow in a secret ballot with 45 out of 90 votes and was thus elected as the new Thuringian Prime Minister. This was only possible thanks to the participation of the AfD. The latter had expressly upheld the candidacy of Kindervater, but together with most of the members of the FDP and CDU voted unanimously for Kemmerich and was the only parliamentary group to spontaneously acknowledge the election result with applause. After Reinhold Maier, Kemmerich became the second elected FDP minister-president of a country in the history of the Federal Republic of Germany, but at the same time the first minister-president ever to rely on votes from the AfD for his election and his government. According to the agenda of the plenary session, the presentation of his government was planned afterwards. Instead, Kemmerich made a short speech to the state parliament and, as chairman of the FDP parliamentary group, requested that the meeting be postponed. This was granted with the votes of the AfD, the CDU and the FDP, against the votes of the left, the SPD and the Greens, with one abstention.

Kemmerich's acceptance of the election won with the votes of the AfD had an enormous echo in society, politics and the media, led to sharp criticism across party lines and was widely regarded as a political “dam break”. At the same time, it triggered a government crisis in Thuringia , whereupon Kemmerich announced his withdrawal on February 6, 2020 and finally resigned on February 8, 2020 with immediate effect. He remained in office until the election of a new Prime Minister and, since he had not appointed any ministers, he formed the Thuringian state government alone. He also continued to hold the positions of chairman of the FDP parliamentary group and chairman of the regional association of the FDP . The state board of his party had unanimously expressed their trust in Kemmerich on February 6, 2020. His term of office, with a duration of only 27 days, the shortest of a Prime Minister of a country in the Federal Republic of Germany, ended on March 4, 2020 with the election of Bodo Ramelow as Prime Minister.

Kemmerich announced that he would be foregoing his salary as Prime Minister and the transitional allowance to be paid out after the end of his term of office, a total of at least € 93,000. If this is not possible, he wants to donate everything that goes beyond his parliamentary remuneration to Thuringian organizations, for example to the Association of Victims of Stalinism , whose Thuringian regional association is headed by a former AfD politician, or to the working group for the reappraisal of the SED -Dictatorship.

Since his election, Kemmerich has been exposed to organized “hatred in the form of threatening letters and mass mails”, according to the FDP state executive. A "direct and immediate threat situation" has led to the fact that in addition to the usual personal protection for the Prime Minister, his home and children are now also protected.

Controversy

Occurrence at corona demonstration

On May 9, 2020, Kemmerich was a speaker at a demonstration under the motto “ Corona -Exit mit Maß und Mitte” in Gera , in which right-wing extremists also took part. Kemmerich neither wore a face mask nor kept the distance regulations. This demo was registered by Peter Schmidt, who sits on the board of the Thuringian regional association of the CDU-affiliated CDU Economic Council and announced Kemmerich in his speech as "for me [...] the only currently legitimate prime minister", without Kemmerich objecting.

The protests, which were held in a similar manner in many places during the COVID-19 pandemic in Germany , were also attended by AfD supporters , conspiracy ideologues and Reich citizens . During the demonstration, the applicable distance rules were often not observed; At the demonstration, a poster relativizing the Holocaust with a Star of David was shown, and AfD member of the Bundestag Stephan Brandner also took part. Both members of Kemmerich's own party and other political voices were irritated and distanced themselves from his behavior. Ria Schröder , chairwoman of the Young Liberals , explained, without naming Kemmerich, "whoever deliberately disregards hygiene measures and joins right-wing extremists is not the middle, but endangers us all and undermines the constructive work". FDP federal board member Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann urged him to resign from the FDP, justifying this by saying that he “is apparently not only looking physically close to the AfD and conspiracy theorists, but […] obviously also their democracy-destroying course “Share. The incumbent Prime Minister of Thuringia , Bodo Ramelow , also criticized him. There was no clear demarcation from anti-Semitism or right-wing extremism and Kemmerich expressly supported this with his participation.

After he had initially repeatedly defended the appearance, Kemmerich said in a video press conference that the demonstration had developed a dynamic that he had "never seen". It was not clear to him that conspiracy theorists and AfD politicians would interfere. His aim was to respond to the concerns of citizens; he has no proximity to the AfD. Kemmerich regretted that the impression arose that he would not adhere to the mask requirement or the rules of distance, and apologized for it. Marco Buschmann , First Parliamentary Managing Director of the Free Democrats parliamentary group , announced on May 13 after a special meeting that Kemmerich was leaving his office on the FDP federal executive board.

Revocation of the Erfurt city council mandate

Kemmerich lives in Erfurt and Weimar. After he was elected to the Erfurt city council in 2009, the city of Erfurt and the Thuringian state administration denied that he could be elected because his family had their main residence in Weimar. Kemmerich sued this decision before the Weimar Administrative Court , which in 2012 recognized Erfurt as his main residence.

Kemmerich also ran for the 2019 local elections in Erfurt, where he won a seat on the city council. A suit was also filed against this. In June, the Weimar Administrative Court ruled that Kemmerich had wrongly obtained the mandate in Erfurt because he was not eligible and had to return it. He had not been able to prove that his "main focus of residence" was in Erfurt, which is why the place of residence in Weimar was his main residence. So far (as of June 2020) the judgment is not final. The public prosecutor's office in Erfurt then took up examinations for possible falsification of election documents.

Private

Kemmerich is Roman Catholic and has been married to a bank employee from Erfurt since 1995. They have three sons and three daughters. Kemmerich also has a child from a previous relationship. He is the deputy chairman of the Association of Large Families Germany Thuringia e. V. He has also been a member of the board of the Liberal Mittelstands Bundesvereinigung eV since 2011.

Web links

Commons : Thomas Kemmerich  - Collection of Images

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Central Council of Jews "horrified" by the election of the Prime Minister in Thuringia. Der Tagesspiegel , accessed on February 5, 2020 .
  2. ↑ Left party leader Riexinger: "FDP and CDU are the stirrup holders of the right-wing extremist AfD". Westdeutsche Zeitung , accessed on February 5, 2020 .
  3. ↑ Kemmerich gives up office - "Resignation is inevitable". In: FAZ , Online. Retrieved February 6, 2020 .
  4. ^ Süddeutsche Zeitung: Thuringia: Kemmerich resigns immediately. Retrieved February 8, 2020 .
  5. ↑ mdr.de: Thuringia: Linke is looking for a strategy for a new Prime Minister election. Retrieved February 9, 2020 .
  6. ↑ Thuringian FDP boss takes Lindner's duty , Spiegel Online, last seen on December 29, 2019.
  7. ↑ Scandal election in Thuringia: Nothing learned from history , Die Tageszeitung (TAZ), accessed on March 3, 2020
  8. ↑ Thomas L. Kemmerich. In: thueringer-landtag.de. Retrieved February 5, 2020 .
  9. ↑ a b c Robert Esser: An Aachen lawyer is now doing half of Thuringia. Aachener Zeitung, October 27, 2009, accessed on February 7, 2020 .
  10. ↑ Company website ( Memento from October 21, 2015 in the Internet Archive ). Retrieved November 30, 2015.
  11. ↑ Imprint. In: Weimar Clock Factory. Retrieved February 5, 2020 .
  12. ↑ Uhrenwerk Weimar GmbH, Jena District Court File number: HRB 514472, announced on April 10, 2018. In: handelsregisterbekanntmachungen.de, accessed on February 5, 2020.
  13. ↑ Article 72, paragraph 2. Accessed February 21, 2020 .
  14. ↑ Without approval in the state parliament. Prime Minister Kemmerich is still the head of a hairdressing chain. In: mdr . February 18, 2020, accessed February 21, 2020 .
  15. ↑ a b Frank Karmeyer: Erfurt OB candidates in Portrait: Thomas L. Kemmerich (FDP). Thüringische Landeszeitung, April 5, 2012, accessed on February 7, 2020 .
  16. ↑ Thomas L. Kemmerich, Member of the Bundestag. FDP parliamentary group (MP’s personal website), accessed on February 7, 2020 .
  17. ^ Elections in Thuringia: District-free city of Erfurt 1st ballot on April 22, 2012. In: wahlen.thueringen.de. Retrieved February 9, 2020 .
  18. ↑ FDP parliamentary group in the city council of Erfurt. erfurt.de (official city portal), accessed on February 5, 2020 .
  19. ^ Thuringia's ex-prime minister: court excludes Kemmerich from city council. N-tv , June 11, 2020.
  20. ↑ Erfurt: Court rejects Kemmerich's city council mandate. Der Spiegel , June 11, 2020.
  21. ↑ Court recognizes Kemmerich's mandate in the Erfurt city council. FAZ , June 11, 2020.
  22. ↑ Thomas Kemmerich is the new Thuringian FDP leader. Die Welt, November 29, 2015, accessed on November 29, 2015 .
  23. ↑ Press release: Members of the Bundestag committees. In: fdpbt.de. Group of Free Democrats in the German Bundestag, January 14, 2018, accessed on January 25, 2018 .
  24. ^ Subcommittee on Regional Economic Policy and ERP Economic Plans. Retrieved March 3, 2019 .
  25. ↑ Thomas Kemmerich is the leading candidate of the FDP. In: mdr.de. Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk , November 17, 2018, accessed on October 25, 2019 .
  26. ↑ Preliminary official final result of the state elections on wahlen.thueringen.de, accessed on October 28, 2019.
  27. ↑ FDP moves safely into the state parliament. In: zeit.de. Die Zeit , November 7, 2019, accessed on November 7, 2019 .
  28. ↑ Five Free Democrats for Thuringia. In: liberale.de. Retrieved November 12, 2019 .
  29. ↑ German Bundestag - Retired members of the 19th electoral term. Retrieved November 17, 2019 .
  30. ↑ a b c d 7th session. (PDF) working version. In: www.thueringer-landtag.de. February 5, 2020, accessed February 14, 2020 .
  31. ↑ Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk Thuringia: Live Ticker - Election Crime in Thuringia , accessed on February 5, 2020.
  32. ↑ Political earthquake in Thuringia - focus - ARD | The first. Retrieved February 8, 2020 .
  33. ^ Thuringia: FDP candidate Kemmerich is prime minister. In: Free Press . 5th February 2020.
  34. ^ Demand from the FDP: "I advise Kemmerich to resign". In: t-online.de. February 5, 2020, accessed February 5, 2020 .
  35. ↑ "Civilization Break" - Thousands take to the streets against the Kemmerich election. In: Die Welt , February 6, 2020. Retrieved May 11, 2020.
  36. ↑ CDU and FDP in distress after “dam break”. In: Tagesschau.de , February 6, 2020. Accessed May 11, 2020.
  37. ↑ " An unforgivable dam break": reactions to Thuringia earthquake. In: Bayerischer Rundfunk , February 5, 2020. Accessed May 11, 2020.
  38. ^ Resignation of the Prime Minister of the Free State of Thuringia in accordance with Article 75, Paragraph 1 of the Constitution of the Free State of Thuringia. (PDF) Briefing by the President of the State Parliament. In: Thuringian State Parliament, printed matter 7/275. February 8, 2020, accessed February 14, 2020 .
  39. ↑ tagesschau.de: Thuringia: Kemmerich resigns as Prime Minister. February 8, 2020, accessed February 9, 2020 .
  40. ↑ "Thomas is our friend". In: Der Spiegel . February 6, 2020, accessed February 21, 2020 .
  41. ↑ FDP Prime Minister: waiver of higher salary. In: krone.at . February 7, 2020, accessed February 9, 2020 .
  42. ↑ Another scandal? Kemmerich wanted to donate to a foundation close to the AfD. In: euronews.com, accessed on February 11, 2020.
  43. ↑ Kemmerich wants to forego money. faz.net, accessed February 7, 2020 .
  44. ^ Carsten Luther: Left, SPD and Greens give Thomas Kemmerich an ultimatum for resignation. In: zeit.de. February 6, 2020, accessed February 7, 2020 .
  45. ^ Robert Roßmann: CDU Economic Council due to demo in need of explanation. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung , May 13, 2020. Retrieved May 17, 2020.
  46. ↑ Lindner criticizes Kemmerich for participating in the Corona rules protest. In: Die Welt , May 10, 2020. Retrieved May 10, 2020.
  47. ↑ Thuringia's FDP leader Kemmerich shares the stage with corona deniers in Gera. In: Tagesspiegel , May 10, 2020. Accessed May 10, 2020.
  48. ↑ Kemmerich admits errors in corona rules protest. In: Berliner Morgenpost. Berliner Morgenpost GmbH, May 10, 2020, accessed on May 10, 2020 .
  49. ^ Criticism of the Thuringian FDP boss for participating in the Corona protest. In: Zeit Online. Zeit Online, May 10, 2020, accessed May 10, 2020 .
  50. ↑ a b Kemmerich: Corona demo has developed dynamics "that I have never seen". www.rnd.de, May 12, 2020
  51. ↑ After demo appearance without mask and distance - Federal FDP debates about the exclusion of Thuringian state chief Kemmerich from the party. MDR May 11, 2020.
  52. ↑ "FDP blows fuses". Kemmerich defends participation in the demo. In: n-tv.de , May 11, 2020. Retrieved May 14, 2020.
  53. ↑ Thuringia's head of state: Kemmerich lets his office on the FDP board rest. tagesschau.de, May 13, 2020, accessed on May 13, 2020 .
  54. ^ Volkhard Paczulla: Erfurt loses litigation against FDP city councilor Kemmerich. Ostthüringer Zeitung, June 11, 2012, accessed on February 7, 2020 .
  55. ↑ Thomas Kemmerich has to resign from the Erfurt city council . In: Die zeit , June 11, 2020. Retrieved June 26, 2020.
  56. ↑ Public prosecutor's office examines possible falsification of election documents . In: Spiegel Online , June 26, 2020. Retrieved June 26, 2020.
  57. ↑ Katja Herr: German-German love story Ute and Thomas Kemmerich: "We are an East-West couple". In: mdr.de. February 5, 2020, accessed February 5, 2020 .
  58. ↑ Sebastian Großert: The prince who became emperor: Thomas Kemmerich in a portrait. In: mdr.de. February 7, 2020, accessed February 7, 2020 .
personal data
SURNAME Kemmerich, Thomas
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kemmerich, Thomas Karl Leonard (full name); Kemmerich, Thomas L.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (FDP), MdB, MdL
DATE OF BIRTH February 20, 1965
PLACE OF BIRTH Aachen