Sven Schulze: From the Harz boy to Prime Minister of Saxony-Anhalt

Magdeburg. The CDU election campaign was strongly tailored to Schulze as a person - “a prime minister for everyone,” it said on the posters. No appointment was too small for him to meet citizens and entrepreneurs. He was Sven from Heteborn in the Harz district. Late in the evening, Schulze often sat on talk shows, and in the early hours of the morning he was already talking to commuters in Magdeburg at the train station.

He and AfD top candidate Ulrich Siegmund also met in direct duels several times. “I don’t just babble, I deliver,” said the CDU politician in the MDR election arena. The CDU politician has been traveling up and down the country in Saxony-Anhalt over the past few months, and he liked to appear shirtless. His message: I'm a local, and while others just talk about problems - I care.

In 2021, as the newly elected CDU state chairman, he went into coalition negotiations with the SPD and FDP and forged a Germany coalition. He then became Minister of Economic Affairs before taking over the helm of the State Chancellery from long-time Prime Minister Reiner Haseloff (CDU) in January 2026. He only had seven months to gain notoriety and profile.

The 47-year-old has worked ambitiously for years to become prime minister. The man from the Harz went through many stages of a classic political career: from local politics to the state chairmanship of the Junge Union to a member of the European Parliament. The industrial engineer graduate originally worked as a sales manager.

Schulze is a football and handball fan; he loves the local Magdeburg clubs and Borussia Dortmund. He also likes rice pudding and rock music, but he can also sing along to Sido. While on the phone, the CDU politician occasionally dribbles the ball around the office.