1. Volker Bouffier was born on 18 December 1951 and is a German politician of the Christian Democratic Union who served as Minister President of the German state of Hessen from 31 August 2010 to 31 May 2022.
12 Facts About Volker Bouffier
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Volker Bouffier's father Robert Bouffier was a lawyer and CDU local politician in Giessen; his grandfather Robert Ferdinand August Bouffier moved from Strasbourg to Giessen in 1906, where he later became a CDU politician.
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Volker Bouffier studied law at the University of Giessen and completed his studies in 1977.
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Volker Bouffier was leader of the Hessian Young Union, the youth organisation of the CDU, from 1978 to 1984.
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Volker Bouffier was first elected to the Parliament of the State of Hesse in 1982.
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Volker Bouffier served as State Minister of the Interior and Sports in the government of Minister-President Roland Koch from 1999 to 2010.
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In 2010, Volker Bouffier was elected vice chairman of the CDU and has since been serving in the party's national leadership under successive chairwomen Angela Merkel and Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer.
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On 8 February 2013, Volker Bouffier agreed to the proposal of the President Joachim Gauck to hold the state elections on the same day as Germany's federal elections.
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Volker Bouffier thereby created only the second CDU-Green coalition to govern a German state, after the previous government of Hamburg.
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On 25 February 2022, Volker Bouffier announced his resignation from the post of minister-president which will become effective on 31 May.
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Ahead of the 2021 Christian Democratic Union of Germany leadership election, Volker Bouffier publicly opposed Friedrich Merz as candidate to succeed Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer as the party's chair.
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Volker Bouffier is married to his wife Ursula, a former radiology assistant.