France, Poland and Austria among nine countries where radical rightwing parties predicted to finish first
Populist “anti-European” parties are heading for big gains in June’s European elections that could shift the parliament’s balance sharply to the right and jeopardise key pillars of the EU’s agenda including climate action, polling suggests.
Polling in all 27 EU member states, combined with modelling of how national parties performed in past European parliament elections, shows radical right parties are on course to finish first in nine countries including Austria, France and Poland.
Projected second- or third-place finishes in another nine countries, including Germany, Spain, Portugal and Sweden, could for the first time produce a majority rightwing coalition in the parliament of Christian Democrats, conservatives and radical right MEPs.
With every economic downturn, the populists will always point the finger at migrants and "external beurocrats denying us our freedoms to self govern". Like any snakeoil salesmen, it a tonic to cure every ailment.
That's mostly because the "Elite" is rarely affected by these economic downturns, sometimes even gets richer quicker. That there's a high potential for lashing out when people see the wealth gap widen one way or another, shouldn't be a surprise.
Surprising no? But still sad as they are -again and again- too stupid to lash out at the actual reason and are easily manipulated to target someone else. And that's usually either low income classes or foreigners, not coincidently because those are lacking a lobby.
Ok hear an European federalist's (me) take on this:
Yes, ID and ECR are set to gain a pretty substantial amount of seats, especially compared to the results of the previous election, as the Guardian's infographic clearly highlights:
However, their conclusion:
As a result, the far-right ID group is projected to gain up to 40 more seats, for a total of 98, potentially making it the third political force and opening up the possibility of a “populist right” coalition (EPP, ECR, and ID) with 49% of MEPs in the new parliament
seems a bit of a stretch. While ID is firmly eurosceptic and ECR is... undecisive, EPP is firmly pro Europe. EPP has been the largest party in the European Parliament for over 20 years, and they are the ones who elected names like von der Leyen and Metsola. I wouldn't call either "Anti-European".
As the POLITICO "Poll of Polls" clearly highlights, the top groups aren't set to change all that much. The most notable changes are Renew losing quite a lot of seats and ID replacing it as the 3rd political force, but EPP and S&D mantain a significant lead.
If ECR and ID ever came to building a "populist right coalition", I doubt EPP would be on their side. I think it's way more likely that they'd side with other forces like S&D or RE and try to stop them.
In conclusion: yeah it sucks that Renew has lost so many seats, and it also sucks that far right voters seem to prefer the way more extreme ID to the comparatively more sane ECR, but things aren't nearly as tragic as the media is portraying them to be.
Populist “anti-European” parties are heading for big gains in June’s European elections that could shift the parliament’s balance sharply to the right and jeopardise key pillars of the EU’s agenda including climate action, polling suggests.
Projected second- or third-place finishes in another nine countries, including Germany, Spain, Portugal and Sweden, could for the first time produce a majority rightwing coalition in the parliament of Christian Democrats, conservatives and radical right MEPs.
The researchers said the implications of the vote were far-reaching, arguing the next European parliament could block laws on Europe’s green deal and take a harder line on other areas of EU sovereignty including migration, enlargement and support for Ukraine.
The left and populist right, including the European Conservatives and Reformists Group (ECR) and far-right Identity and Democracy (ID), are set to emerge as the main victors, with a real possibility of entering a majority coalition for the first time.
Their voices willcarry most weight in several founding-member states, the polling suggests, with Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy forecast to boost its MEP tally to 27 and Marine Le Pen’s National Rally on track to win a record 25 seats.
Populist eurosceptic parties are likely to come first in Austria, Belgium, the Czech Republic, France, Hungary, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland and Slovakia, and second or third in Bulgaria, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Portugal, Romania, Spain and Sweden.
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