In November 2024, following the government crisis, he replaced Free Democratic Party (FDP) politician Bettina Stark-Watzinger as Federal Minister of Education and Research.

[3] Born in Urach,[1] a small town in the hills between Stuttgart and Ulm, Cem Özdemir is the son of Gastarbeiter ("guest worker") parents from Turkey.

After qualifying for advanced technical college entrance he studied social pedagogy at the Evangelical University of Applied Science in Reutlingen, Germany.

[citation needed] From 1994 until 2002, Özdemir was a member of the German Bundestag; along with Leyla Onur of the Social Democrats, he was the first person of either Turkish or Circassian descent ever elected to the country's federal parliament.

[13] He was also criticised for having taken out a credit with Moritz Hunzinger, a German PR consultant and lobbyist, in order to overcome personal financial issues.

In addition, he served as the European Parliament's rapporteur on Central Asia[1] and as vice chair of the Permanent Ad Hoc Delegation for Relations with Iraq.

Özdemir's rival candidate was Volker Ratzmann, leader of the Green parliamentary group in the Berlin House of Representatives, who eventually withdrew his candidacy on 4 September 2008 for personal reasons.

In September 2019, Özdemir unsuccessfully challenged incumbents Katrin Göring-Eckardt and Anton Hofreiter at the middle of the legislative term and announced his candidacy to co-chair the Green Party's parliamentary group, together with Kirsten Kappert-Gonther.

[19] Following the announcement of Fritz Kuhn to not seek re-election as Mayor of Stuttgart in 2020, Özdemir was widely considered a potential successor.

[20] In the negotiations to form a coalition government under the leadership of Minister-President of Baden-Württemberg Winfried Kretschmann following the 2021 state elections, Özdemir was a member of the working group on economic affairs, labor and innovation.

[21][22] In May 2021, several months ahead of the national elections, various media outlets reported that Özdemir had been late to declare to the German Parliament's administration a total of €20,580 in additional income he had received over the course of five years – 2014 through 2018 – in his capacity as leader of the Green Party.

[25] Following the 2021 German federal election, the Greens entered government as part of a traffic light coalition led by Social Democrat Chancellor Olaf Scholz, and Özdemir was sworn in as Food and Agriculture Minister on 8 December 2021.

[26] In October 2023, Özdemir participated in the first joint cabinet retreat of the German and French governments in Hamburg, chaired by Scholz and President Emmanuel Macron.

In October 2024, SWR reported that Cem Özdemir wants to become the Green Party's top candidate in the state elections in Baden-Württemberg in spring 2026.

[31] Amid the 2013 Cypriot financial crisis, Özdemir proposed making an EU bailout for Cyprus conditional on reviving talks about reunification of the island divided since 1974.

[34][35] In 2011, Özdemir stepped down from the Quadriga Award's board of trustees to protest the nonprofit group's decision to honor Prime Minister Vladimir Putin of Russia.

Upon Erdoğan's attacks, the Turkish ambassador in Berlin, Hüseyin Avni Karslıoğlu, was summoned to the German Foreign Office and was informed about Germany's unease on the prime minister's remarks.

[42] Soon after, Özdemir told Spiegel Online it would be "irresponsible" for German intelligence services not to target Turkey given its location as a transit country for Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant militants from Europe.

[46][47][48] Özdemir called for the German government to stop giving contracts to the American consultancy firm McKinsey & Company, which was accused of gathering information for the Saudi Arabia's regime about its critics.

In December 2014, his parliamentary immunity from prosecution was lifted when Berlin prosecutors opened an investigation into suspected growing of drugs after an Ice Bucket Challenge video showed him with a cannabis plant in the background.

[63] In a subsequent interview with Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, Özdemir stated that "in a free society it should be up to each individual person to decide whether they want to consume cannabis and take the associated risks.

He believes it is necessary "to give voice to every citizen, woman and man, all over the world; to create legitimacy by true representation, and to enhance political responsibility of the states' leaders.

According to him, "The introduction of a maximum speed on motorways in Germany would have only advantages: fewer traffic fatalities, immediate climate protection and practically no costs".