Berlin's dismissed digital state secretary to receive over €50,000 in transitional pay

Why the payout stands

Hundt's monthly gross salary as state secretary had been nearly €12,000. The transitional allowance is calculated on the basis of that income and his period of service, which totals roughly two and a half months. Because he was dismissed against his will by the Senate rather than leaving voluntarily, the law entitles him to the payment, a point Wegner himself conceded in the House of Representatives. 'Leider gelten diese beamtenrechtlichen Regelungen,' Wegner said when asked why the Senate had not simply accepted Hundt's original withdrawal.

The dismissal came against the backdrop of insolvency proceedings opened on 25 November 2025 over the assets of Hundt's consulting company, SDC Sachsen Digital Consulting GmbH. The Dresden public prosecutor's office is investigating in connection with the insolvency. Hundt's lawyer has stated that his client had not committed any wrongdoing and had reached agreements with all major parties affected by the insolvency. The presumption of innocence applies to Hundt, and no charges have been reported.

Opponents pile on in parliament

Speaking in the Berlin House of Representatives, Wegner described the relationship with Hundt in unusually stark terms. 'Das Vertrauensverhältnis ist nachhaltig gestört, es war und ist nachhaltig zerstört,' he told lawmakers, declaring the trust between them permanently destroyed. The governor had appointed Hundt to the post in mid-March and was now publicly disowning the decision.

The opposition seized on the affair to attack Wegner's personnel management. Left Party faction leader Tobias Schulze accused the Senate of having placed an important office in the hands of an impostor. 'Sie haben ein so wichtiges Amt offenbar einem Hochstapler und Blender überlassen,' Schulze said in the House of Representatives. Green Party faction leader Werner Graf called the appointment one 'die so nicht hätte passieren dürfen,' while AfD faction leader Kristin Brinker said it was unacceptable to install someone in a public office without proper checks on qualifications and prior career record.

A wider pattern of turnover

The criticism has fed into a wider narrative of churn inside the Berlin Senate. According to figures cited in the German press, in Kai Wegner's three years as Governing Mayor, three senators and eight state secretaries have changed, left, or been dismissed, and of those eleven personnel changes, ten involved CDU nominees. Hundt's predecessor as Digital State Secretary, Martina Klement, left Berlin to become Economics Minister in Brandenburg, where residents had been able to obtain a Bürgeramt appointment within 14 days under her watch in the capital.

Hundt's CV had already drawn scrutiny before the Berlin appointment. He had applied to head the state digital agency in Saxony but was excluded from the application process because he could not provide a job reference, according to reports. He subsequently sued unsuccessfully over that exclusion, placing the dispute on the public record.

Hundt's path to the post

During his 69 days in office, Hundt also clashed publicly in parliament with the head of the state-owned IT service center, an episode that further eroded his standing inside the administration. After the dismissal, Florian Hauer, Berlin's representative to the federal government and state secretary for federal and European affairs, took over Hundt's digital portfolio on a side basis alongside his existing duties.

The combination of a short tenure, an insolvency probe, and a six-figure transitional payment is likely to keep the affair in political circulation. The Tagesspiegel commentator Robert Ide, who appears every Thursday from 6 a.m. on Berliner Rundfunk 91.4, has been among the voices tracking the story. For Wegner, the episode is the latest in a string of high-profile personnel setbacks, which has also included the departures of cultural administration figures Joe Chialo and Sarah Wedl-Wilson, and one that the opposition shows no sign of letting go.

Berlin's Senate Chancellery has not indicated whether it will seek to recover any portion of the transitional allowance, and Hundt has not commented publicly since his dismissal. With the Dresden investigation still open and the political fallout continuing, the case looks set to remain a touchstone in debates over how the city vets its senior appointees.