Barnett first became a member of the German Bundestag in the 1994 federal elections, representing the Ludwigshafen/Frankenthal electoral district. In the 1994 and 1998 elections, her opponent of the CDU was incumbent Chancellor Helmut Kohl.[1] For her election campaign in 1998, she recruited Marc S. Ellenbogen as her advisor.[2][3]
Barnett was part of the SPD parliamentary group’s leadership from 1998. Within the group, she served as a member of the working group on the world economy between 2003 and 2013.
Barnett was a member of the Committee on Labour and Social Affairs between 1994 and 2005. From 2002 to 2005, she also served on the parliament’s Council of Elders, which – among other duties – determines daily legislative agenda items and assigns committee chairpersons based on party representation.
A long-time member of the Budget Committee and its Sub-Committee on European Affairs, Barnett served as her parliamentary group's rapporteur on the budget of the Federal Foreign Office, including Germany’s humanitarian aid. In this capacity, she also belonged to the SPD working group on the national budget. From 2018, she chaired the Sub-Committee on European Affairs. In 2019, she also joined the Committee on Economic Affairs and Development.
In addition to her committee assignments, Barnett served as deputy chairwoman of the German-Russian Parliamentary Friendship Group from 2018 to 2021.
