Time for the center-left in the European Parliament to step up

The ‘majority’ that voted for Ursula von der Leyen less than a year ago no longer exists. As feared, the People’s Party (EPP) has chosen the role of the free agent; in fact, it could probably already be said that, supported by the votes of the center-left and a large part of the Greens, it has chosen to work in alliance with the extreme right, the one so much condemned by its president Manfred Weber, led by the Hungarian premier Viktor Orban.

By now, one can no longer count the instances in which the EPP has chosen the votes of the ECR conservatives, Orban’s Patriots, and whoever is on the right to carry out its policies. It started with a test on Venezuela within weeks after von der Leyen’s confidence vote, and it continues, in a flurry, with the demolition of the Green Deal. The latest case was the open investigation into funding received by environmental NGOs; the next one is already ready and will concern the greenwashing regulations. The Socialists, the Liberals, and the Greens are raging against this drift, but it is a profoundly futile effort. The EPP goes ahead on its path of alliance with the extreme right without officially getting its hands dirty with the Patriots but accepting their votes, while the rest of the ‘majority’ struggles, chained in its vote of confidence.

Given that von der Leyen willingly accepts this state of affairs, the center-left has only one option: to remove the support from the EPP. And there is only one way to do this: to call for a motion of no confidence in von der Leyen.

An act of this kind would force the Populars to come out into the open: would they take a step back and realign themselves to the policies of the ‘majority’ with Socialists, Liberals, and the Greens who are on board, or would they seek the votes of the extreme right, in addition to those of the ECR, those of the Patriots, Sovereign Nations and whatever else they could find? That way, they would give her a majority, which would be out in the open. What would von der Leyen think of that?

Until now, the EPP has not had to ‘dialogue’ with Patriots and others from the extreme right but has often gathered their votes, only to find that its allies voted against it when they gave von der Leyen their vote of confidence. It is high time that if this is the majority on which Weber wants to base his political action, the EPP dares to tell all Europeans: we have broken with the Liberals, with the Socialists, with the Greens, and we prefer to ally ourselves with Orban and other extremist forces.

Of course, for the center-left, it would mean facing a difficult period, but it would certainly also mean suffering less humiliation; it would mean playing a political and not an umbrella role in this legislature. That is, if the EPP dares to do so.