Dietmar Gerhard Bartsch (born 31 March 1958) is a German politician who has served as co-chair of The Left parliamentary group in the Bundestag since 2015. Prior, he served as federal treasurer of The Left from 2006 to 2009 and federal managing officer from 2005 to 2010. He was a prominent member of The Left's predecessor party, the PDS, of which he served as treasurer from 1991 to 1997 and federal managing officer from 1997 to 2002. He has been a member of the Bundestag since 2005, and previously served from 1998 to 2002. In his capacity as Bundestag co-leader, he served with Sahra Wagenknecht from 2015 to 2019, and with Amira Mohamed Ali since 2019. Bartsch has served as federal co-lead candidate for his party on three occasions: 2002, 2017, and 2021. Personal life Bartsch was born and raised in Stralsund, East Germany, today located in the German state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. After completing his schooling at the EOS Franzburg in 1976, he studied political economy at the University of Economic Studies at Berlin-Karlshorst, graduating in 1983. Following graduation, Bartsch joined the business department of the German daily paper Junge Welt. From 1986 until 1990, he studied at the Academy for Social Sciences at the Communist Party of the Soviet Union headquarters in Moscow, before returning to the Junge Welt as their business executive. Bartsch is married and has two children. Political career Bartsch joined the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED), the ruling party of East Germany, in 1977. He co-founded the Committee of Young Comrades (AGJG) in 1989. Following German reunification, Bartsch remained a member of the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS), serving as federal treasurer and later federal managing officer. He was elected to the Bundestag in 1998. In the 2002 German federal election, Bartsch was one of four lead candidates for the PDS, alongside Gabi Zimmer, Petra Pau, and Roland Claus. The party failed to meet the five percent electoral threshold, and only returned two representatives, both directly elected in constituencies. Bartsch thus lost his seat in the Bundestag. He was subsequently asked to resign as federal managing officer, and declined to seek re-election in October. However, he was nominated for the position again by PDS leader Lothar Bisky in 2005, and elected to the position in December. He returned to the Bundestag in the 2005 election. After the merger of the PDS into The Left