“The essential objective in this campaign is to sanction a government”, deciphers a Europe specialist

Patrick Martin-Genier, teacher at Sciences Po and INALCO, specialist in Europe, was the guest of franceinfo on Tuesday.

Gabriel Attal gets his hands dirty. Monday April 29, the Prime Minister confirmed that he intended to debate with Jordan Bardella, the head of the National Rally list for the European elections. Tuesday evening, he donned the costume of majority leader for the first campaign committee, at the headquarters of the Renaissance party. Around him, around fifty personalities, all supporters of Emmanuel Macron. A major challenge for the President of the Republic because even if the elections are European, the challenge is also national, explains Patrick Martin-Genier, teacher at Sciences Po and at INALCO, specialist in Europe. He was the guest of Franceinfo on Tuesday evening.

Franceinfo: Is the issue of the European elections also at national level?

Patrick Martin-Genier: It’s true that we always have to talk about Europe, but whether in France or elsewhere, the European vote has always been an intermediate vote which allows the government to be sanctioned. We are mainly talking about domestic issues and in particular security and immigration. It’s always been like this. When you look at the migration issues, it is France and also Europe. When you talk about the environment, it’s Europe, but also on a national scale. In fact, there is an interaction, an interweaving of national issues with European issues. But the essential objective in this campaign is to sanction a government for Emmanuel Macron’s policies since his re-election. In Germany, we want to sanction Chancellor Olaf Scholz. Or possibly, as in Italy, we want to sanction Giorgia Meloni, the far-right President of the Council, who herself, because she sees that there are risks, is taking the lead in this electoral campaign. So we can clearly see that these national and European issues are very intertwined. What would be interesting and beneficial for voters is that we are talking about major European issues and it is true that we do not talk about them much there.

Is this sanction vote, which may exist in Germany and Italy, generalized in the 27 countries of the Union or are there other countries where this is not the case?

Indeed, there are other countries where we talk a lot about European issues, particularly in relation to the war in Ukraine, in relation to European defense. We will talk about these security issues in the Baltic States and in the Northern countries, but also elsewhere, in other countries. And that’s what’s interesting, these are the major European issues that we need to talk about today. But it’s true that this is what is missing in this internal political debate in France.

In your opinion, will this vote in the 27 countries of the Union lead to a change of majority in the European Parliament?

What is certain is that there will be a considerable strengthening of the extreme right in this European Parliament. Look in Germany, the AFD, the far-right party, is at 18 or 20%. The far right has increased in Portugal and Spain. The far right is also present in Sweden. It’s going up everywhere. As for saying that it will have a majority in the European Parliament, I don’t believe it. Because polls show that the main parties will remain the moderate Christian Democratic right, and the Socialist Party – which continues to exist -, then the Greens who remain in support, as well as the liberals of which Renew is a part. So there will be a majority which could possibly remove the far right from responsibilities in the European Parliament, but it will considerably increase its positions and could have a nuisance effect.