Head of the stock exchange supervisory authority wants to be the head of the FDP in Hamburg

The graduate economist Beate Schlueter opens the round of candidates for the presidency of the Elbe Liberals. "The FDP Hamburg is two years ago with very decisive elections," said the 60-year-old on Thursday. The party must expand its seats in the seven district assemblies in 2024, send successful MPs to Europe again and turn the two hard-working MPs into a parliamentary group again in 2025.

"It is therefore immensely important that the party is led by someone who can campaign and has both feet firmly planted in Hamburg life," said Schlueter, thereby declaring her candidacy. The position had to be filled after the incumbent state chairman, Michael Kruse, recently announced that he would not be running again. The elections will take place on the first weekend in April at the state party conference of the FDP.

According to Schlueter, he has "decades of experience" in Hamburg's economic and financial policy and administration. She has been in charge of the Hamburg stock exchange supervisory authority for twelve years, and until 2018 she also promoted retail and the city center on behalf of the economic authority. The economist was also part of the team that implemented EU structural funding in the St. Pauli district. Because she studied economics in Hamburg, she has “a great affinity for port, transport and logistics policy,” said Schlueter.

Their goal is clear: "The FDP Hamburg must become more visible again in order to successfully contest the district and European elections and to return to the Hamburg Parliament in 2025 with the strength of a faction." represented by two non-attached MEPs. Entry into the state parliament failed in 2020.

According to Schlueter, the marathon back to the town hall can only be achieved as a team effort. She says: "This team is the party with a self-contained board at the top: goal-oriented and solidary, open to debate and with decency in dealing - that's my offer." She looks forward to "many constructive discussions and a lively exchange" with the members of the Elbe Liberals, according to the 60-year-old. At the end of last year, the national association had 2,125 members.

An attitude that could prove useful, since the Hamburg FDP is considered to be particularly divided. Between 1993 and 2014 alone, the Elbe Liberals wore out 13 state chairmen, garnished with open trench warfare full of vanity, resentment and intrigues. Kruse took over the office from Katja Suding in 2021 and subsequently clashed with four young liberals (JuLis).

The trigger for the dispute, which ran bitterly for months, was that the former JuLi boss Carl Cevin-Key Coste had criticized Kruse's announcement of a lawsuit against the Hamburg Corona hotspot rules in spring 2022 as a "PR action and unworthy of a constitutional party". After further verbal accusations by and against the JuLis, the executive board started a party exclusion procedure against the four critics, which is why they in turn initiated arbitration proceedings with the support of the former Federal Minister of the Interior Gerhart Baum (FDP).

The incumbent head of state, Kruse, did not respond to this quarrel when he declared his refusal to run again at the end of February. Instead, he pointed out that his Bundestag mandate required a great deal of attention. “Energy policy is the area of ​​the coalition that requires the most intensive consultation and legislation, and therefore requires a high level of personal commitment every day, right into the night and on weekends.” Such a situation was not there two years ago, when he became head of the FDP in Hamburg been foreseeable. Kruse has been in the Bundestag since 2021, where he acts as energy policy spokesman for his parliamentary group.

Beate Schlueter's application as state chairman will not be the only one, although the state association currently has no further candidacy, as a spokesman said when asked by WELT. It is questionable, for example, whether the FDP top candidate in the 2020 general election, Anna von Treuenfels-Frowein, will also throw her hat in the ring. Svenja Hahn, Member of the European Parliament, and Ria Schröder, Member of the Bundestag, could also have a chance of getting the job. The race for the post has begun.