[1][2] From 2013 until 2021, Pronold served as Parliamentary State Secretary in the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety in the government of Chancellor Angela Merkel.

Together with Doris Ahnen, Niels Annen, Martin Dulig and Gabriele Lösekrug-Möller, Pronold co-chaired the SPD’s national convention in Berlin in 2014.

[7] In June 2015, in the election to the Bavarian state chairman of the SPD, there was a counter-candidature by the 71-year-old pensioner Walter Adam from Lower Bavaria, who criticized Pronold violently and was supported in his candidacy by the director Konstantin Ferstl.

At the same time, he proposed the general secretary of the SPD national association, Natascha Kohnen, as party leader and top candidate for the state elections in 2018.

Ahead of the 2013 elections, Peer Steinbrück included Pronold in his shadow cabinet for the Social Democrats’ campaign to unseat incumbent Angela Merkel as chancellor.

In the third coalition government of Chancellor Merkel from 2013 until 2018, Pronold served as Parliamentary State Secretary to the Minister for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Building and Nuclear Safety Barbara Hendricks.

[11] Since 2023, Pronold has been the managing director of the Institut Bauen und Umwelt e. V. (IBU), an association of building material manufacturers.

[12] As Juso state chairman, Pronold called the crucifix in the 1990s in a satirical article in a youth magazine "Lattengustl" (literally "Slat Gustl") and was criticized for this.

"[17] In March 2007, Pronold was disinvited by Fritz Schösser, the DGB chairman in Bavaria, as a speaker from the May 1 rally, because he "betrayed" trade union positions by his approval in the Bundestag of the health care reform and the "pension at 67".

The SPD district administrator Michael Adam attacked Pronold on his Facebook page personally and in terms of content.