Petra Roth is descended from a Bremen-based family of merchants. After she left the :de:Kippenberg-Gymnasium|Kippenberg-Gymnasium, which has a special concentration in music, with a General Certificate of Secondary Education, she completed an apprenticeship as a medical secretary. Later she passed her exam at an upper business school. Love led her from Bremen to Frankfurt am Main. She is described as interested in the arts. She has two sons and has been widowed since 1994.
Political career
Early beginnings
Petra Roth joined the Christian Democratic Union in 1972 after she had moved to Frankfurt. Later she was elected to the local city council and between 1987 and 1995, to the Landtag of Hesse. Between 1992 and 1995 she was chair of the CDU in Frankfurt.
On 25 June 1995, Roth was elected mayor of Frankfurt, defeating the incumbent :de:Andreas von Schoeler|Andreas von Schoeler and becoming the city's first directly elected woman mayor. In 2001, she won the second round in a tight race against :de:Achim Vandreike|Achim Vandreike. Meanwhile, Roth is longest-serving Frankfurt mayor since World War II. On 28 January 2007, Roth was re-elected in the first round with 60.5% of the votes but with voter participation of only 33.6%. Her rival candidate :de:Franz Frey|Franz Frey got 27.5% of the votes. Roth was briefly considered as a potential successor to Federal President Johannes Rau. In March 2008 she was considered a potential candidate for Minister-President of the State of Hesse. From 1997 to 1999 and from 2003 to 2005, Roth served as president of Deutscher Städtetag, a position she took up again in 2009. She was also member of the Committee of the Regions of European Union. During her time in office, Roth was a member of the board of Frankfurt International AirportFraport, chairman of the supervisory boards of the Frankfurt trade fairMesse Frankfurt, of the municipal utility company Stadtwerke Frankfurt am Main, of the regional transport services company Rhein-Main-Verkehrsverbund, and the regional housing society ABG Frankfurt Holding.
Political positions
Within the CDU, Roth is considered a proponent of religious tolerance and a moderate stance regarding topics such as building of mosques in Germany, migration and integration, as well as drug treatment policy. Ahead of the Christian Democrats’ leadership election in 2018, Roth publicly endorsed Friedrich Merz to succeed Angela Merkel as the party’s chair.
