A major announcement for the European Parliament, slipped in one evening during a French election. “Our MEPs will play tomorrow fully play their role within a large group which will have an impact on the balance of power in Europe”declared Jordan Bardella on the evening of the second round of the legislative elections, Sunday July 7. The leader of the National Rally, whose party made strong progress without obtaining the majority it had hoped for, announced in the process the rallying of his party to the Patriots for Europe in the European Parliament. He even became their president.
This group, initiated by Hungarian nationalist Prime Minister Viktor Orban, defends a sovereignist line, opposes military support for Ukraine and intends to promote the “traditional family”With 84 MEPs from around ten countries, Patriots for Europe will constitute the third force in the European Parliament, in front of the political families of Giorgia Meloni and Emmanuel Macron. Franceinfo explains the positioning of this new formation.
A group founded by Hungarian nationalist Viktor Orban
“A new era begins“, said the Hungarian Prime Minister on Sunday, announcing the creation of the Patriots for Europe group from Vienna, Austria. Viktor Orban says he wants “change European policy”. To form this group, the leader, already supported by the Czech Andrej Babis, founder of the centrist and populist party Ano, and the Austrian Herbert Kickl, leader of the far-right FPÖ, still needed the support of elected representatives from four other member states.
It was soon joined by five parties: the Party for Freedom (PVV) of the Dutch Geert Wilders, the Portuguese Chega, the Spanish Vox, the Danish People’s Party and the Flemish far-right pro-independence party Vlaams Belang. On Monday, after The National Rally and the League of the Italian Matteo Salvini joined them.
We’re getting stronger every day: @RNational_off join our party group, #PatriotsForEurope.
French patriots, welcome! pic.twitter.com/jyaaW6PIse— Tristan Azbej (@tristan_azbej) July 8, 2024
“By creating this new group, Viktor Orban wants to exercise leadership over the European nationalist and illiberal right,” analysis with franceinfo Thierry Chopin, special advisor to the Jacques-Delors Institute. He needs all the more allies since his party, Fidesz, lost a seat and only has 11 elected representatives at the end of the European elections in May. They therefore do not hold a “important institutional power” in Brussels, explains this specialist in European politics.
In the previous legislature, several Patriots parties, including the National Rally, were members of the Identity and Democracy (ID) group, now emptied of its troops. Only two small parties, from Estonia and the Czech Republic, did not follow their allies into the Patriots for Europe. Vox, for its part, left Giorgia Meloni’s European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group. More surprisingly, the Czech party Ano is joining them from Renew Europe, where it sat until now with, in particular, the French MEPs of Renaissance.
The third force of the European Parliament
With the rallying of the RN, which is sending 30 MEPs to Brussels, and the 8 elected members of the Italian League, the Patriots have a total of 84 MEPs of 12 nationalities. The group therefore becomes, for the time being, the third force in the European Parliament, behind the group of the pro-European right (European People’s Party, EPP) and its 188 members, and that of the social democrats (S&D), which has a total of 136 elected members.
Composition of the “Patriots for Europe”
🇫🇷 National Rally: 30
🇭🇺 Fidesz: 11
🇮🇹 League: 8
🇨🇿 ANOTHER: 7
🇦🇹 FPÖ: 6
🇪🇸 Vox: 6
🇳🇱 PVV: 6
🇧🇪 Flemish Value: 3
🇨🇿 Oath & Motorists: 2
🇵🇹 Check: 2
🇩🇰 Danish People’s Party: 1
🇱🇻 Latvia first: 1
🇬🇷 Voice of reason: 1— François Beaudonnet 🌎 (@beaudonnet) July 8, 2024
With the largest number of MEPs, the RN has de facto taken over the leadership of the Patriots. The objective is to represent “the sovereignist movement” For “really influence the decisions of Parliament”declared RN MEP Jean-Paul Garraud to AFP“We are resolutely against the ultra-federalist aspect of the EU, the fact that it wants to dominate the States at all costs.”
The strength of the Patriots should allow its members to have more speaking time and financial resources. And potentially to land key positions: vice-presidents of Parliament, committee chairs, rapporteurs… Even if it is highly likely that the EPP, the S&D, the Greens and the radical left (The Left) will oppose the nomination of any elected member of this group.
“Until now, there was a cordon sanitaire, going from the EPP to the liberals, to prevent the appointment of far-right elected officials to positions of responsibility.”
Thierry Chopin, special advisor to the Jacques-Delors Instituteto franceinfo
Can this cordon be maintained with the new amplitude of the Patriots? “With the electoral developments, it seems difficult to me to continue to oppose us with this totally anti-democratic position”retorts RN Jean-Paul Garraud. Furthermore, the room for maneuver of the majority coalition in Parliament (PPE, social democrats, liberals) is expected to be reduced, and the adoption of legislation more difficult. “The center of gravity has shifted to the right of the right, nationalist voices will be stronger”confirms Thierry Chopin. All the more so if the Patriots ally themselves with ECR, the other far-right group, with which they share ideas. “There will be greater unpredictability, greater instability”imagines the political scientist.
A gathering of personalities close to Russia
The Patriots have a Russophile tendency. Viktor Orban, whose country holds the six-month rotating presidency of the EU Council, is the only EU leader who has remained close to the Kremlin since the start of the war in Ukraine. On July 5, he traveled to Moscow to meet Vladimir Putin and discuss the conflict, bristling his European partners. At the beginning of the year, he had also vetoed a €50 billion package sent by the EU to kyiv, which was finally validated late. A line that distinguishes him in particular from Giorgia Meloni and the ECR group.
The Austrian FPÖ, through its leader Herbert Kickl, also supports Moscow and has denounced European sanctions against Russia, recalls The worldAs for Matteo Salvini, the leader of the Italian League, he displayed his admiration for Vladimir Putin for years, before distancing himself from him.
These positions recall the ambivalence of the National Rally regarding Moscow. During the campaign for the legislative elections, Jordan Bardella again assured that he supported kyiv and would not let “Russian imperialism absorbing an allied state like Ukraine.” “The RN has a strategy of normalization at the national level, but it continues to sit at the European level with parties that have a radicalization position,” points out Thierry Chopin. “The RN and Jordan Bardella are taking a step towards a sort of clarification”adds Erwann Lecoeur, a political scientist specializing in the far right at the University of Grenoble Alpes, on franceinfo. “They are entering a group that is very clearly rather anti-EU, rather pro-Putin…In a certain way, it will also perhaps weigh on the future of the RN in France, if ever the French media talk about it.“
Homophobic, racist and antivax positions
Beyond Viktor Orban, already known for his attacks on the rule of law in Hungary, his attacks on the right to asylum, his LGBTphobic laws and suspicions of embezzlement of public funds, the Patriots group includes in its ranks several other parties or personalities who have already defended discriminatory positions.
The leader of the Austrian Freedom Party (FPÖ), Herbert Kickl, has been making a virulent speech against migrants, the press and vaccination. In 2021, in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, he brandished on television a medical certificate showing that he had no antibodies linked to the coronavirus, in order to counter “rumors” according to which he would have made himself “vaccinate in secret”reports RTBF. In Belgium, Vlaams Belang advocates the independence of Flanders and espouses the conspiracy and racist thesis of the “great replacement”, while Vox, in Spain, displays an anti-migrant and xenophobic discourse.
In Italy, General Roberto Vannacci, elected to the European elections on the League list, does not hide his admiration for the dictator Benito Mussolini, and believes that ecology is “ideological” And that femicides are an invention, list The worldHe also made numerous homophobic and racist remarks, stating about the black Italian volleyball player Paola Egonu that “his features do not represent Italianness”or writing in a book that homosexuals were not “normal”.
“I am not aware of these comments, I do not share them and I condemn them.”assured Jordan Bardella, questioned on this subject during the European campaign. Roberto Vannacci is now one of his six vice-presidents at the head of Patriots for Europe.