Katja Hessel

Katja Hessel
Katja Hessel in 2016
Member of the Bundestag
Incumbent
Assumed office 2017
Personal details
Born	(1972-05-05) 5 May 1972 (age 52) Nürnberg, West Germany (now Germany)
Political party	FDP
Alma mater	University of Erlangen–Nuremberg

Katja Hessel (born 5 May 1972) is a German lawyer and politician of the Free Democratic Party (FDP) who has been serving as a member of the Bundestag from the state of Bavaria since 2017. ^[1]

In addition to her parliamentary work, Hessel has been serving as Parliamentary State Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Finance in the coalition government of Chancellor Olaf Scholz since 2021. ^[2]

Early life and career

Hessel was born in Nuremberg in 1972. In 1991, she passed her Abitur and then studied law in Erlangen until 1996. She passed her first state examination in 1996 and her second in 1998.

Kessel started working as a lawyer in her own law firm in 1999 and became a tax consultant in 2002.

Political career

In 1999, Hessel joined the FDP. She was a State Secretary in the Bavarian State Ministry of Economic Affairs, Infrastructure, Transport and Technology under minister Martin Zeil in the government of Minister-President Horst Seehofer from 2008 to 2013.

Hessel became a member of the Bundestag in the 2017 German federal election, representing the Nuremberg North district. From 2018 until 2021, she was a member of the Finance Committee, which she chaired from 2020.

In addition to her committee assignments, Hessel is part of the German-Japanese Parliamentary Friendship Group.

In the negotiations to form a so-called traffic light coalition of the Social Democratic Party (SPD), the Green Party and the FDP following the 2021 federal elections, Hessel was part of her party's delegation in the working group on financial regulation and the national budget, co-chaired by Doris Ahnen, Lisa Paus and Christian Dürr. ^[3]

Since 2023, Hessel has been serving as co-chair of the FDP in Bavaria, alongside Martin Hagen. ^{[4] [5]}

Other activities

Corporate boards

• Deutsche Telekom, Member of the Supervisory Board (since 2022) ^{[6] [7]}

Non-profit organizations

• Federal Foundation for the Reappraisal of the SED Dictatorship, Member of the Board of Trustees (since 2022) ^[8]
• German Federal Environmental Foundation (DBU), Member of the Board of Trustees (since 2022) ^[9]
• Max Planck Institute for Tax Law and Public Finance, Member of the Board of Trustees (since 2022) ^[10]
• Kiwanis, Member

References

1. "Katja Hessel | Abgeordnetenwatch". www.abgeordnetenwatch.de (in German). Retrieved 15 March 2020.
2. Katrin Schirner (4 December 2021), Katja Hessel: Lindner setzt auf diese Frau Bayerischer Rundfunk .
3. Ampel-Koalition: Das sind die Verhandlungsteams von SPD, Grünen und FDP Archived 1 November 2021 at the Wayback Machine Deutschlandfunk , 27 October 2021.
4. Johann Osel (23 October 2023), Bayern-FDP setzt nach Wahlniederlage auf Doppelspitze  Süddeutsche Zeitung .
5. Regina Kirschner and Georg Wolf (11 November 2023), Hagen übersteht Kampfabstimmung – Bayern-FDP mit Doppelspitze Bayerischer Rundfunk .
6. Supervisory Board: Katja Hessel Deutsche Telekom.
7. Philipp Alvares de Souza Soares (2 March 2022), Nach Abtritt von Softbank-Manager: Unruhe im Telekom-Aufsichtsrat  Handelsblatt .
8. Foundation Bodies Federal Foundation for the Reappraisal of the SED Dictatorship.
9. Lemke beruft neue Mitglieder in das Kuratorium der Deutschen Bundesstiftung Umwelt Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Nuclear Safety and Consumer Protection, press release of 9 June 2022.
10. Board of Trustees Max Planck Institute for Tax Law and Public Finance.

External links

• Official website (in German)
• Bundestag biography (in German)