Caren Lay

Caren Nicole Lay (born 11 December 1972) is a German politician (Die Linke).

After graduating with a degree in sociology, she first worked as a lecturer at the Free University of Berlin from 1999 to 2000, and as a parliamentary-scientific advisor in the PDS faction of the Landtag of Saxony in Dresden from 2000 to 2003.

She then moved to the Ministry of Consumer Protection, Food and Agriculture as a speechwriter for Renate Künast, the Federal Minister responsible at the time.

Lay was a member of the Landtag of Saxony from 2004 to 2009, deputy leader of the Left Party, and spokesperson for labor market policy.

In autumn 2006 she initiated the foundation of the Emancipatory Left, together with Katja Kipping.

In addition, she was Parliamentary Secretary of the parliamentary group from 2007 to 2009.

In addition, she was a member of the board there, a member of the Committee on Economic Affairs, Labour and Transport, as well as Chairwoman of the 2nd Committee of Inquiry into the Corruption Affair and Chairwoman of the 1st Commission of Enquiry on Demographic Development.

From 2007 to 2018, Lay was a member of the executive committee of the party Die Linke.

In 2007, she joined the Forum of Democratic Socialism caucus.

At the Federal Congress in April 2008, she was elected one of the Forum's three speakers, along with Stefan Liebich and Inga Nitz.

She has been a member of the Bundestag since 2009 and has been deputy chairperson of the Die Linke parliamentary group in the Bundestag since 2017.

Since 2009, Caren Lay has been a member of the Bundestag.

She was elected to the Bundestag via the Saxony state list.

From 2009 until the end of 2015, she was the spokesperson for consumer policy in her parliamentary group.

In the course of the protests against the Agenda 2010 of the red-green government, Lay joined the PDS in 2004.

She was Federal Executive Director from 2010 to 2012, and then Deputy Chairwoman, from 2012 to 2018, of her party.

After her nomination as Federal Managing Director in 2010, she gave up this position.

She later resigned from the FDS.

From 2012 to 2018, she was one of the deputy chairpersons of her party.

In the run-up to the Göttingen Federal Party Congress 2012, she pleaded together with Katja Kipping, Katharina Schwabedissen, Jan van Aken and Thomas Nord for a "Third Way" beyond the reform-oriented and traditional wing of the left.

Caren Lay is a member of the trade union ver.di, the German Tenants' Association, the nature conservation association BUND, the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation, the VVN-BdA, Attac, the Rent and Living Network, and the German Alpine Club.

The party nominated her as one of its eight top candidates in January 2013.

In October 2013 she became deputy parliamentary party leader and head of the working group "Structural and Regional Policy."

In March 2014, the Bundestag lifted her immunity so that the Dresden public prosecutor's office could continue to investigate against her; Lay had participated in a obstructing a Nazi demonstration in Dresden in 2011.

Lay and her parliamentary group colleague Michael Leutert, who was also affected, rejected criminal prosecution as unlawful, citing an expert opinion of the Bundestag's Scientific Service, according to which the Saxon Assembly Act was not valid at the time of the crime due to a formal error and the Federal Act was not applicable to the demonstrators.

The Immunity Committee did not follow this opinion.

On 12 February 2015, the Dresden public prosecutor's office discontinued the proceedings without conditions or payments on the grounds that the guilt appeared to be slight.

Since January 2016, Lay has been spokesperson for rent, construction and housing policy for the parliamentary group Die Linke in the Bundestag.

Caren Lay is active in housing policy and has been the spokesperson for rent, construction and housing policy of the Die Linke parliamentary group in the Bundestag since 2016.

Caren Lay promotes a "red-red-green" government alliance at federal level.

Together with members of the SPD, Alliance 90/The Greens, and the Left Party in the Bundestag, she organized several meetings of the "Trialogue for a progressive policy."

After the Bundestag elections in 2017, she was elected as deputy leader of the parliamentary group.

When the party executive committee was re-elected in June 2018, she decided not to run for office again, stating that she wanted to concentrate on her work as deputy parliamentary party leader in the Bundestag.

Lay is considered a representative of the libertarian, undogmatic spectrum of her party.

In November 2019, Lay unsuccessfully applied to succeed Sahra Wagenknecht as co-chairperson of the Die Linke parliamentary group in the Bundestag.

She was defeated by Amira Mohamed Ali in a competitive vote.

Born in Neuwied, Lay comes from a working-class family.

After graduating from high school in Andernach, she studied sociology with a focus on political science and women's studies at the Philipps-Universität Marburg and the Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main, as well as in Pennsylvania.

On 12 November 2019, Lay unsuccessfully applied to succeed Sahra Wagenknecht as Co-Chairwoman of the Left Parliamentary Group in the Bundestag.

She lost to Amira Mohamed Ali by 29 votes to 36.