Sonneborn grew up with his brother as a son of the career counselor and later presidential candidateEngelbert Sonneborn and a housewife. He went to school in Osnabrück, where he successfully passed the Abitur exam. After the selective service and the graduation of an apprenticeship as an insurance merchant he studied Communication, German and Politics in Münster, Vienna and Berlin. His magister thesis covered the satirical magazine Titanic and the range of effectivity of satire. Sonneborn's father was an independent candidate in the 2017 German presidential election.
Career
After undertaking an internship at satirical magazine Eulenspiegel in 1995, Sonneborn started writing for Titanic, whose editor-in-chief he became in 2000. He was superseded by Thomas Gsella in October 2005, but remained column writer until April 2012. He has been co-editor of Titanic since 2006. Sonneborn was staff leader of satirical column SPAM at Spiegel Online since November 2006 and reporter for the satirical TV programmeheute-show on ZDF from May 2009 to September 2014. On August 2, 2004, Sonneborn founded along with other editors of Titanic the satirical political party Die PARTEI, one of whose aims is to rebuild the Berlin Wall. He has been its chairman since 2004 and was top candidate in 2011 Berlin state election. During the election campaign 2005 Sonneborn appeared in a number of TV campaign commercials. Along with director Andreas Coerper, Sonneborn filmed a documentary about the party's development and activities from foundation until 2009. He regularly holds readings both discretely and as part of the trio Titanic Boygroup, together with Thomas Gsella and Oliver Maria Schmitt who preceded Sonneborn as editor-in-chief. After joining the European Parliament in 2014, he had to quit his jobs at Spiegel Online and ZDF since both companies wanted to stay objective in presenting politics. He is member of the European Parliament Committee on Culture and Education, member of the Korea-delegation and substitute of the European Parliament Committee on Budgetary Control.
Controversy
In 2000 he became famous for a bribery affair regarding the 2006 FIFA World Cup assignment to Germany, in which he offered FIFA officials a small gift for their vote in favor of Germany. In late 2009, he was criticized in a Chinese newspaper for "hurting the feelings of the Chinese people" in a broadcast about the 2009 Frankfurt Book Fair on the heute-show. In September 2011 he was criticized by UK media for a blackface Obama billboard "Ick bin ein Obama." in the Berlin election campaign, a satirical reference to a speech by John F. Kennedy.
