Europe: the center-right strengthens its majority in Parliament while the extreme right advances

The first projections of the results of the European elections show that the center-right strengthened its majority in Parliament, while far-right parties won new seats.

“The center remains,” said the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyencelebrating the victory of European People’s Partywhich obtained 191 seats and consolidated itself as the majority bloc in the European Parliament.

However, far-right parties made progress in France, Germany, Italy and Austriawhile the liberal and green parties retreated.

It is estimated that electoral participation was 51%, slightly higher than in 2019.

Around 360 million voters elected 720 new members of the European Parliament.

In an unexpected decision, the French president, Emmanuel Macrondissolved his country’s Parliament and called early elections to be held in two rounds, on June 30 and July 7, after his alliance suffered a major defeat against the far right.

Exit polls indicate that the Marine Le Pen National Group could defeat Macron’s party, in a historic victory for the far-right party.

Macron’s decision was surprising and constitutes a great political gamble.

Although I had flirted with the idea of dissolve the French Parliament Last year, after being defeated in France’s last general election, few expected Macron to announce such a move now, explains Katya Adler, BBC Europe editor.

These early elections could force the French president, who describes himself as a centrist and a passionate European, to work with a far-right prime ministerskeptical of Europe.

For her part, Marine Le Pen, who is routinely portrayed as Macron’s political nemesis, declared on Sunday that her party is ready to govern.

The scenario of a president and prime minister from different parties working together has been presented before in France. However, it would be a novelty if the new prime minister came from the extreme right.

The conservative opposition parties won both Germany like in Spain.

The German Chancellor Olaf Scholzfaces the biggest defeat, given that the Social Democrats were surpassed by the far-right party Alternative für Deutschland (AfD)reported Paul Kirby, BBC Europe editor from Brussels.

AfD leader Alice Weidelsaid that this electoral result, which is around 16% of the votes, shows that his party is ready for victory in Germany.

In the case of Spain, with almost all of the votes counted, the conservative People’s Party won with 34.2% of the votes, ahead of Socialist Party of the president Pedro Sanchezwhich obtained 30.2%.

The extreme right party Vox obtained 9.6% of the vote and won three new seats, while a new radical right party, The party is overgot its first MEPs by obtaining 4.6% of the votes.

The left alliance Addjunior partner of the ruling coalition, obtained 4.7% of the votes, while its rival Can had a bad day, winning only two seats with 3.3% of the votes.

For his part, the Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ)from the far right, seems headed for a narrow but historic victory in the European vote.

Brothers of Italythe far-right party led by Giorgia Meloniwon the majority in the Italian vote.

This victory for Meloni, who has led a coalition government since 2022, should translate into more than 20 of the 76 seats that Italy occupies the European Parliament.

This result indicates that Meloni managed to double the representation of his party in just five years, explains Laura Gozzi, BBC reporter from Rome.

However, a non-negligible percentage of Italians voted for the opposition Center-left Democratic Party (PD)which obtained just over 20% of the votes, a better result than 2019 and that exceeds the expectations of many of its militants.

Meloni appears to have a firm grip on Italian politics. Interestingly, she is also the only leader among “big” European countries, such as France, Germany and Spain, to perform well in this year’s European elections.

This result implies an unusual situation in the history of Italy, which is now one of the most politically stable countries in Europe.

The Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Crooannounced that he will resign after the disappointing election results.

Through tears, she stated that it had been “a particularly difficult evening.”

This weekend there was a lot at stake for Belgian voters, who not only voted in the European Union elections, but also in the federal and regional elections.

At the national level, the largest far-right party, Vlaams Belangmade progress, but less than expected.

In contrast, the left and green parties made the greatest gains in Sweden, Finland and Denmark.

The socialists of the portuguese opposition won a narrow victory, but the best result for the left came in Denmark, where the Left Green was on its way to becoming the largest party, defeating the ruling Social Democrats of Mette Frederiksen.

The victories of the extreme right and the nationalist right in the European Parliament reflect the concerns of voters regarding the Migration, inflation and the cost of environmental reforms.

Although far-right parties made progress in several countries in the European Unionit is not clear whether they will really be able to influence the bloc’s politics.

The majority of seats in the European Union chamber where laws are debated, amended, approved or rejected remain firmly in the hands of centrist parties.

To have influence on European politics, far-right parties across the bloc will have to unite. And that is a challenge, given that they have different national priorities and deep differences on fundamental issues, such as support for Ukraine against Russia.

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