This Sunday’s European elections have resulted in a great advance by the ultra-nationalist and Eurosceptic parties, which was no less disturbing because it was predicted. The parties opposed to advancing European integration or openly in favor of reversing it have managed to be the most voted force in France, Italy, Austria and Hungary, and the second in Germany, Poland and the Netherlands. And although they have participated in the elections separately, if they unite or add all their seats they would form the second largest group in the European Parliament, only behind the winning party, the European People’s Party (EPP), and ahead of the socialists.
The result forces the pro-European parties, particularly the EPP, to examine their conscience about the reasons that have led almost a quarter of the electorate to opt for options that, if they manage to impose their theses, would seriously endanger the model of peace, prosperity and freedom that Europeans have enjoyed for decades. The strategy of the European People’s Party of assuming some of the postulates of the extreme right on issues such as migration or climate change has only managed to give credibility to parties that defend an unsustainable environmental agenda and inhumane treatment of migrants and refugees.
Progressive parties, such as socialists, liberals and greens, have also generally failed – with Spain as the most notable exception – in asserting to voters responses that have proven effective and positive for the common good in crises. more recent, such as those caused by the pandemic and the war in Ukraine.
The composition of the new European Parliament predicts a high-risk legislature for the EU. Even disunited, the ultra forces of Germany (AfD), France (RN, of Marine Pen), Italy (FdI, of Giorgia Meloni), Spain (Vox), Poland (PiS, of Jarosław Kaczyński) and Holland (PVV, of Geert Wilders) will enjoy a large representation on behalf of the six most populous countries of the Union. And its ability to set the agenda, block initiatives or drag the EPP towards extreme positions has been significantly reinforced.
9-J will thus mark a turning point in the future of the Eurosceptic and nationalist forces, which cease to be an anomaly in some countries but without relevance for the Union as a whole and become formations with the possibility of forging the majorities necessary to change the course of Brussels, even at the cost of endangering everything built, from the Schengen area to the internal market.
The result raises a question about the formation of the new Commission and places the main candidate to preside over it, the current president, Ursula von der Leyen, in the position of achieving a comfortable majority that will allow the Union to advance. The tripartite that supported it (popular, socialists and liberals) until now had 59% of the seats. She now seems condemned to move even further away from the two-thirds that allow legislating with some comfort in Strasbourg and Brussels. The support of the greens would become essential to form a quartet that, in any case, would be incompatible with any opening towards the omnipresent extreme right from this Sunday.
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Electoral victory, failed plebiscite
In a context of triumph for the European right-wing constellation, including its ultra and anti-European version, the Popular Party won the elections in Spain but could not obtain a result up to the challenge it had posed to the citizens, that of massively showing its rejection of Pedro Sánchez. Alberto Núñez Feijóo’s party, which won by four points, obtained 22 MEPs compared to 20 for the PSOE, which holds out with 30.2% of the votes with the most destabilizing opposition of this democracy and after making decisions as controversial as the law. of amnesty.
In the month of March, the pollsters closest to the PP estimated an advantage of up to 11 points, and although in recent weeks the popular ones have been adjusting expectations, their entire campaign has focused on putting the Spanish people before the obligation to provoke a defeat of the socialists that would force Sánchez to call general elections or justify a motion of censure of the PP.
Macron anticipated the legislative elections this Sunday after the extreme right won by a difference of 18 points. The victory of the PP by four makes it an unequivocal winner, but it does not cause any consequences other than confirming that radical discourse is growing in Spain: the most extreme PP absorbs Ciudadanos, Vox rises almost three and a half points – it goes from 4 to 6 MEPs – and Se Acabó La Fiesta, an even more populist candidacy that shows that parallel realities find an echo, gets 800,000 votes and 3 seats. This is the result of assuming the discourse of the ultras. The left to the left of the PSOE once again demonstrated its hesitant evolution and its crisis could be a factor of instability for the Government.
Since May of last year, Spain has undergone six electoral processes. The result in all of them categorically denies that the country is experiencing the exceptional political situation that the right and the extreme right have projected since July 23, 2023, when they fell short of seats to govern. A fictitious situation of exceptionality amplified by the media support of the PP, some anomalous behavior in the field of justice and, in general, by all those who considered themselves referred to by Aznar’s request for “he who can make him do it” to cause the fall of the coalition government.
The Spaniards have behaved in all the elections with absolute normality. Neither from the turnout at the polls – participation was 49% – nor from the results can it be deduced that the majority of the population believes that democracy is in danger or that the Government is acting beyond the successes and errors of an Executive. legitimate that addresses extraordinary situations or undertakes major changes with greater or lesser success.
The only novelties in this long cycle are the defeat at the polls of the independence movement at the hands of the PSC – which this Sunday won again in Catalonia -, the Basque normalization of the left abertzale and the growth of the extreme right. Although neither in Spain nor in Portugal did the ultras occupy the first two positions, the PP must reflect by looking in the mirror of the French Republicans or the Austrian Christian Democrats, devoured by their extremes in these elections. Supervising the Government, criticizing it and trying to wear it down is part of democratic life. Destabilizing institutional life and torpedoing Spain’s possibilities in the EU as a whole is an exercise that, given what has been seen, provides a modest return to the PP, which does not find in the Spaniards the answer to a prefabricated alarm. It is time for the legislature to fully begin.
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