Johannes Arlt | |
|---|---|
 Arlt in 2023 | |
| Member of theBundestag | |
| Assumed office 2021 | |
| Constituency | Mecklenburgische Seenplatte II – Landkreis Rostock III |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1984-04-23)23 April 1984 (age 41) |
| Political party | Social Democratic Party |
Johannes Arlt (born 23 April 1984 inBerlin) is a German soldier and politician of theSocial Democratic Party (SPD) who has been serving as amember of the GermanBundestag since the2021 elections. He has been serving as a direct candidate for the constituency ofMecklenburgische Seenplatte II - Landkreis Rostock III.
Johannes Arlt grew up inNeustrelitz,[1] where he attended the “Geschwister-Scholl” elementary school and then the Carolinum grammar school.[2] He completed his Abitur in 2003 at the Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach Music High School in Berlin, where he spent his final years.[3] Arlt began his career as aconscript and was commissioned as a military officer.[4] From 2004 to 2005, he attended the 92nd Air Force Officer Training Course at the Air Force Officer School inFürstenfeldbruck.[5][6] He studied political and social sciences at theUniversity of the German Armed Forces in Munich from 2006.[4] He completed his studies in 2009 with adegree in political science (univ.).[7]Initially, in 2010, he was aplatoon leader in theguard battalion at the Federal Ministry of Defense,[4] and from autumn 2011 he was anadjutant to Brigadier General Rainer Keller as commander of the Air Force Training Command.[8][9] Arlt was appointed a professional soldier in 2012.[4] From 2013 to 2015, he led the staff company and staff platoon of the Air Force training battalion inGermersheim with the rank ofcaptain.[9] Then, he was assigned to theAir Force Command in the International Cooperation Division. Between 2014 and 2019, he took part in seven Bundeswehr deployments abroad as part of theISAF andRSM mandates in Afghanistan andMINUSMA in Mali.[10] He most recently served in thegeneral staff service with amajor rank.[10] In 2016, he spent several months inIsrael training to become a tactical operator for theHeron 1 military drone, i.e. particularly the operator of its reconnaissance equipment.[11] Arlt has more than 1,000 flight hours in this role.[4]After completing staff officer training at theBundeswehr Command and Staff College in Hamburg, he continued to work in the Air Force Command in the International Cooperation andArms Control Division.[9] From October 2018, he was assigned to the Joint Operational Planning Group at theBundeswehr Operational Command.[7]
From 2019 to 2021 Arlt completed his studies at theSwedish Defence University (FHS) inStockholm.[12][10] As part of this, he also obtained aMaster of Science in War Science and a degree with distinction from the Royal Household.[7]From 2009 to 2015, he also worked as managing director in an event management company.[13]
Arlt joined theSPD in 2000.[14]From 2002 to 2004 he was sub-district chairman of theJusos Nordost and member of the Juso federal executive.[15]
Arlt has been aMember of the German Bundestag forMecklenburg Lake District II - Rostock District III inMecklenburg-Western Pomerania as of the2021 German federal election.[16][17] Arlt won the constituency with 31.1 per cent of the first votes[18][19] and thus entered the 20th German Bundestag.[17][19] He has since been serving on the Defence Committee and the Committee on Economic Affairs.[20]His parliamentary office in the constituency is spread across severalcoworking spaces. In addition, two buses serve as mobile parliamentary offices.[4] In the 2025 federal election, he failed to regain a seat in the Bundestag.[21]He is a candidate in the district council election in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania 2025 in the district of Mecklenburgische Seenplatte.[22]
Ahead of the2025 national elections, Arlt endorsedBoris Pistorius as the Social Democrats' candidate to succeedChancellorOlaf Scholz.[23]
Arlt is a member of the Heimatverband Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and the Semper talis Bund.[7]
His father, who died in November 2007 at the age of 51, was one of the founding members of the SPD in Neustrelitz in January 1990.[10] Since 2019, Arlt has been married to a Danish man.[24][10] The couple has one child.[25][14] He lived inStockholm for two years[4] and is of the Evangelical Lutheran denomination.[7][14]
