Ursula von der Leyen

Say what you will about career politicians, but Ursula von der Leyen is genuinely hard to pigeonhole — she trained as a medical doctor at Hannover and Göttingen before pivoting into German federal politics, and somehow that combination of analytical discipline and bureaucratic endurance is exactly what kept her climbing. She spent over a decade in Angela Merkel's cabinet, cycling through some of the toughest ministerial portfolios in Germany, and in 2019 she became the first woman to lead the European Commission — no small thing in an institution not exactly famous for dramatic firsts. She's polarizing, sure: her surveillance-friendly positions earned her Big Brother Awards in 2009 and 2017, which is a genuinely awkward distinction for someone holding that much institutional power. But watching her steer EU pandemic response and navigate the fallout from Russia's invasion of Ukraine, you get the sense she thrives precisely when the situation is intractable. Whether you like her politics or not, the woman does not wilt under pressure.

Name (English)

Ursula von der Leyen

Name (Japanese)

ウルズラ・フォン・デア・ライエン

Reading

うるずら・ふぉん・であ・らいえん

Born

October 8, 1958 (age 67)

Zodiac / Chinese zodiac

Libra / Dog

Origin

Ixelles, Belgium

Height

161 cm

Occupation

physician / politician / equestrian

University

University of Göttingen

Awards & achievements

• 2014 language adulterator award
• 2017 BigBrotherAwards
• 2009 BigBrotherAwards
• Knight Grand Cross of the Order for Merits to Lithuania
• 2021 language adulterator award
• 2022 Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 1st class
• 2022 BBC 100 Women
• 2022 Time 100

Motto

Private

• Instagramhttps://www.instagram.com/ursulavonderleyen/
• Xhttps://x.com/vonderleyen
• Wikipedia (Japanese)https://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E3%82%A6%E3%83%AB%E3%82%BA%E3%83%A9%E3%83%BB%E3%83%95%E3%82%A9%E3%83%B3%E3%83%BB%E3%83%87%E3%82%A2%E3%83%BB%E3%83%A9%E3%82%A4%E3%82%A8%E3%83%B3

Tags

• physician
• politician
• equestrian

Last updated

2026-06-02

Facts are limited to publicly available information up to 2024; non-public or unconfirmed items are omitted. English text is machine-assisted (facts translated by Sonnet, "My Take" written by Opus 4.8). The Japanese page is the source of record.