CDU as a three-letter abbreviation can refer to:

Angela Dorothea Merkel, German: [aŋˈɡeːla doʁoˈteːa ˈmɛʁkl̩] ( listen); née Kasner (born 17 July 1954) is the Chancellor of Germany and Chairwoman of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU). Merkel is the first female Chancellor of Germany.

A physical chemist by professional background, Merkel entered politics in the wake of the Revolutions of 1989 and briefly served as the deputy spokesperson for Lothar de Maizière's democratically elected East German government prior to the German reunification. Following reunification in 1990, she was elected to the Bundestag, where she has represented the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern since. She served as Federal Minister for Women and Youth 1991–1994 and as Federal Minister for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety 1994–1998 in Helmut Kohl's fourth and fifth cabinets. She was Secretary General of the CDU 1998–2000, and was elected chairperson in 2000. From 2002 to 2005, she was also chair of the CDU/CSU parliamentary coalition.

After her election as Chancellor following the 2005 federal election, she led a grand coalition consisting of her own CDU party, its Bavarian sister party, the Christian Social Union (CSU), and the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), until 2009. In the 2009 federal election, the CDU obtained the largest share of the votes, and formed a coalition government with the CSU and the liberal Free Democratic Party (FDP).

Peter Altmaier (born 18 June 1958 in Ensdorf, Saarland) is a German politician. He has been a member of the CDU since 1976. A jurist by profession, he worked for the European Commission from 1990 to 1994. He has been a member of the Bundestag since 1994. Since 2005, he has been a secretary of state in the Federal Ministry of the Interior (Germany). From 2006 to 2011 Altmaier was president of Europa-Union Deutschland, the German section of the Union of European Federalists. Altmaier replaced Norbert Röttgen as Federal Minister for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety on 22 May 2012.

Sigmar Gabriel (born 12 September 1959 in Goslar) is a German politician currently chairing the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD).

On 15 December 1999, after the resignation of Gerhard Glogowski, who had succeeded Gerhard Schröder in office, Gabriel became Minister-President of Lower Saxony and served until 4 March 2003. After being voted out of office, he became the SPD's "Representative for Pop Culture and Pop Discourse" from 2003 to 2005, for which he was bestowed the nickname Siggi Pop. From 2005 to 2009 he was the Federal Minister for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety in the first cabinet of Angela Merkel (CDU).

He has promoted the International Renewable Energy Agency. He called the speeches of Thilo Sarrazin, his party colleague who wrote critically about immigration, "verbal violence," . Gabriel called Israel an "Apartheid-Regime".

Following the SPD's defeat in the federal election of 2009, Franz Müntefering resigned from the position of party chairman of the Social Democratic Party. Gabriel was nominated as his successor and was elected on 13 November 2009. Gabriel was re-elected as party chairman for a further two years at the SPD party conference in Berlin on 5 December 2011, receiving 91.6% of the vote.

Peer Steinbrück (born January 10, 1947) is a German social democratic politician. From 2005 to 2009 he served as German Federal Minister of Finance in the cabinet of Angela Merkel.

Steinbrück was born in Hamburg. After having been trained as an officer of the reserve of the Bundeswehr, Steinbrück studied economics in Kiel. He graduated in 1974.

After graduation Steinbrück worked for several German ministries and, from 1978 to 1981, in the office of German Chancellor Helmut Schmidt. In the 1980s, Steinbrück was Chief of Staff to the Minister President of North Rhine-Westphalia, Johannes Rau.

In 1993, he became Minister of Economy and Infrastructure in the State of Schleswig-Holstein. He then returned to North Rhine-Westphalia, where he became Minister of Economy and Infrastructure in 1998 and Finance Minister in 2000.

From 2002 to 2005, Peer Steinbrück served as Minister President (Ministerpräsident) of North Rhine-Westphalia. He headed a coalition government between the SPD and the Green Party.