Germany to Get EU Top Job for First Time in Half Century

(Bloomberg) -- Ursula von der Leyen would become the first German in more than half a century to assume the European Union’s most powerful policy-making post should she win EU Parliament backing on Tuesday evening in Strasbourg, France. The German defense minister is bidding to succeed Jean-Claude Juncker of Luxembourg as president of the European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, on Nov. 1, when she would also become the first woman to hold the job. The only other German to head the commission is Walter Hallstein, the organization’s first president from 1958 to 1967.

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