Carsten Sieling  Carsten Günter Erich Sieling (born 13 January 1959) is a German politician of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) who served as the President of the Senate and Mayor of the Free Hanseatic City of Bremen from 2015 until 2019. His successor is Andreas Bovenschulte. From 2009 to 2015, Sieling was a member of the Bundestag, where he served on the Finance Committee. During the time of position held, he was his parliamentary group's rapporteur on consumer protection in financial services. Between 2010 and 2013, he was a member of the Sub-Committee on Municipal Policy. From 2012, he also served as deputy chairman of the German-British Parliamentary Friendship Group. Sieling resigned from his seat in parliament to become President of the Senate and Mayor of Bremen in July 2015, succeeding Jens Böhrnsen. As one of the state's representatives at the Bundesrat, he served on the Committee on Foreign Affairs and on the Committee on Defence. Between October 2015 and October 2016, he chaired the Conference of Ministers-President. In the negotiations to form a coalition government under the leadership of Chancellor Angela Merkel following the 2017 federal elections, Sieling was an SPD delegate in the working group on social affairs, led by Karl-Josef Laumann, Barbara Stamm and Andrea Nahles. Following his party's result in the 2019 state elections, Sieling resigned from his office.