Gabriele Zimmer
Gabriele "Gabi" Zimmer is a German politician who served as Member of the European Parliament for Germany from 2004 to 2019. She is a member of The Left and sat with the European United Left–Nordic Green Left group in the European Parliament, which she chaired from 2012 to 2019. Previously, she served as leader of The Left's predecessor, the Party of Democratic Socialism, from 2000 to 2003.
She joined the Socialist Unity Party of Germany, ruling party of the German Democratic Republic in 1981. After its transformation into the Party of Democratic Socialism in 1990, she became the party's leader in the new state of Thuringia, a position she held until 1998. She was a member of the Landtag of Thuringia, the state parliament, from 1990 until 2004. She became deputy leader of PDS in 1996, and in October 2000 she was elected leader. However, after the party failed to pass the 5% electoral threshold in the 2002 federal election, she chose not to stand for re-election, and left the leadership in May 2003. She remained active in the party, and was elected to the European Parliament in 2004. In 2007, PDS merged into The Left, and Zimmer was re-elected as an MEP representing The Left in 2009 and 2014. In 2012, she became the chairwoman of the GUE/NGL group in the European Parliament. She chose not to stand for re-election in the 2019 European Parliament election.
