Christine Lambrecht


Christine Lambrecht is a German lawyer and politician of the Social Democratic Party who has been serving as Minister of Justice and Consumer Protection in the government of Chancellor Angela Merkel since 2019. She previously served as one of two Parliamentary State Secretaries at the Federal Ministry of Finance from 2018 until 2019. Prior to that, she held various roles within the SPD parliamentary group, including as a deputy leader and Chief Whip.

Education and early career

Lambrecht attended the Albertus-Magnus-Gymnasium in Viernheim, in the German state of Hessen and in 1984 she passed her Abitur. After this she studied law at the Universities of Mannheim and Mainz, where she graduated in 1992 and completed an internship at State Court in Darmstadt.

Political career

Career in local politics

Lambrecht joined the SPD in 1982 and was a member of the Viernheim City Council from 1985 till 2001, of which she was the chair in the years 1997 till 2001. Additionally she was a member of the Bergstraße County Council from 1989 until 1997.

Member of the German Parliament, 1998–present

Lambrecht has been a Member of the Bundestag since the 1998 elections. From 1998 until 2002 she was the member for Bergstraße, however, she lost against her CDU challenger in the 2002 federal election and has subsequently always been elected via the SPD Hessian state list. In parliament, she has served on the Committee on Legal Affairs, the Committee on Sports and on the Council of Elders, which sets the agenda for the parliamentary sessions. Lambrecht is seen as being on the left wing of the SPD parliamentary group.
From 2002 until 2005 and from 2013 until 2017, Lambrecht served on the parliamentary body in charge of appointing judges to the Highest Courts of Justice, namely the Federal Court of Justice, the Federal Administrative Court, the Federal Fiscal Court, the Federal Labour Court, and the Federal Social Court.
Following the 2009 elections, Lambrecht became her parliamentary group's spokesperson on legal affairs. In 2011, she was elected as a deputy leader of the SPD parliamentary group, under the leadership of chairman Frank-Walter Steinmeier. She was a deputy leader of the group till her election as Chief Whip of the SPD Parliamentary Group after the 2013 federal election. In the ensuing negotiations to form a third coalition government under Chancellor Angela Merkel, she was part of the SPD delegation in the working group on internal and legal affairs, led by Hans-Peter Friedrich and Thomas Oppermann.
In the negotiations to form Merkel’s fourth coalition government following the 2017 federal elections, Lambrecht was part of the working group on financial policies and taxes, led by Peter Altmaier, Andreas Scheuer and Olaf Scholz. In Merkel's fourth cabinet, she joined the federal government as one of two Parliamentary State Secretaries serving under Finance Minister Olaf Scholz.

Federal Minister of Justice, 2019–present

On 19 June 2019 it was announced that Lambrecht would succeed justice minister Katarina Barley on the 1 July 2019, after the latter moved to Brussels to serve in the European Parliament.
During Lambrecht's time in office, German authorities fined Facebook 2 million euros for under-reporting complaints about illegal content on its social media platform in breach of the country’s law on internet transparency. In December 2019, she proposed a law requiring internet service providers like Gmail or WhatsApp to handover personal data including passwords upon request.

Other activities

Lambrecht has one son.