The 43-year-old politician received 84 of 139 votes in the House of Representatives on Tuesday (Dec. 21, 2021) and now leads a red-green-red Senate. She takes the place of her party colleague Michael Müller, who moved to the Bundestag after seven years in Berlin City Hall. After her election, Giffey was sworn in. She then plans to take over the official duties in City Hall and appoint the ten senators who will be sworn in at the House of Representatives.

In addition to the head of government, the SPD has four senators, while the Green and the Left Party have three each. With seven women and four men, the new Berlin Senate has more female repesentation than ever before. The government team will meet for its first session in the early evening. The SPD, the Green Party and the Left Party have been governing together in Berlin since 2016, but new faces predominate in the new Senate. The coalition agreement for the next five years was presented on November 29. Subsequently, party congresses of the SPD and the Greens approved it by a large majority. The Left Party also said "yes" in a membership vote.

Berlin now has a female governing mayor for the first time - and, for the first time since reunification, one that was born in the former GDR. However, Giffey is not the first female leader of the capital: In 1947/1948, the SPD politician Louise Schroeder served as acting mayor in post-war Berlin.