EU elections ahead; winners, losers, reactions

EU citizens will elect the next class of EU lawmakers in June next year, and as European parties and groups begin to gear up for the elections, EURACTIV’s back-to-school forecast ahead of a heated pre-election year reveals the future dynamics of parliamentary seat allocation, power shifts and leaders’ reactions.

In a nutshell

• Right-wing strengthens as ECR, ID groups score 27 extra seats
• Centrist majority prevails against right-wing surge
• The biggest loser is the Greens/EFA group, losing 20 seats, followed by EPP (-16) and Renew Europe (-12).
• S&D and Left groups freeze but undergo seat reshuffle
• ID could shift from Italian to French leadership, as current President Marco Zanni’s party Lega would give way to France’s Rassemblement National as the strongest force in the group.
• Reactions: Greens are hopeful about their capability to mobilise voters; ECR takes pride in ‘Eurorealism’ and slams the left. Renew Europe seeks to remind voters of the importance of the group’s kingmaker role, and EPP questions polls.

Right-wing ‘Eurorealists’ score 27 extra seats

The results show prominent gains in the right-wing spectrum, with national-conservative European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) Group predicted to grow by 16 from its 66 seats in the 2019 elections. At the same time, the far-right and eurosceptic Identity and Democracy group is projected to secure 73 seats, 11 more than in 2019.

ECR group’s co-president Nicola Procaccini attributes the right-wing success to its ‘Eurorealist, pragmatic” approach, which he says is attracting much interest.

‘Voters have less confidence in the previous majorities and left-wing approaches to solving Europe’s tangible and obvious problems. More bureaucracy, for example, is not the answer. What we need is more efficiency in the areas that matter most to citizens’, such as external borders, internal market, and economic recovery, Procaccini told EURACTIV.

Such a discourse has proved especially effective in Romania, where the far-right AUR party is now the third force and is projected to enter the European Parliament for the first time with eight seats.

Major ECR winners also include Spain’s VOX, which while not scoring the expected results in the snap national elections in July and losing its chance of entering government, is projected to increase its seats from four to nine.

Contrarily, Polish governing party PiS could lose five seats, from 24 to 19, while Italy’s governing party, Fratelli d’Italia led by Georgia Meloni, is the biggest winner with 19 extra seats.

Meloni’s party popularity has kept skyrocketing since Italy’s elections in September 2022, when it entered government in a trio coalition with Salvini’s Lega (ID) and Tajani’s Forza Italia (EPP). Such a move has proven costly for Lega, as Fratelli d’Italia’s growth has been inversely proportional to Lega’s demise, with the party losing 16 seats out of the 25 they won back in 2019.

Lega’s new seat allocation combined with a five-seat increase, from 18 to 23, by Le Pen’ “Rassemblement National” could translate into a change of leadership within ID from Italy to France, as the current leader is Lega MEP Marco Zanni, and “Rassemblement National” could use this new wight within the group to oust him.

ID’s other wins include three more MEPs for Austria’s “FPÖ” and three seats for Portugal’s far-right party “Chega!”(Enough!), which could enter Parliament for the first time.

Centrist majority prevails, but losses loom over Renew and EPP

The idea of a right-wing majority, initially promoted by the Italian conservative governing trio, would not take place, and the traditional informal coalition between the liberal Renew Europe group, the Socialists and Democrats (S&D), and centre-right European People’s Party (EPP) would prevail instead with 395 out of 705 seats.

However, while S&D manages to retain its number of MEPs, the EPP drops from 177 to 160 seats, while Renew Europe drops from 101 to 89 seats.

Renew’s losses can be primarily attributed to the death of Spain’s liberal party “Ciudadanos”, which, amid catastrophic results after regional elections, decided to retrieve their candidacy for the snap elections held in July. The party’s death translates into 8 MEPs less for Renew.

While Macron’s “Renaissance” would also lose one seat, other liberal parties are set to increase representation. Most notably, Poland’s new coalition Trzecia Droga would enter the Parliament with five MEPs, 3 for Renew, while Czechia’s ANO would contribute to Renew’s balance with four extra seats, from five to nine. That is if the party does not get expelled from ALDE and Renew, as ANO has been under heavy scrutiny for not committing to liberal values.

Renew Europe is confident they will continue as the kingmaker in the next legislature, a spokesperson told EURACTIV in reaction to the projection, adding that “Europe is governed in the centre or is simply ungovernable”.

“The campaign will be the occasion to remind voters that we are the only group capable of avoiding a populist stranglehold on the European parliamentary agenda”, the spokesperson said.

“We will come to the voters with a strong legacy, on the rule of law, Green Deal, Digitalisation, and our unambiguous stances on European integration to protect democracy, (…) the parties which are the clearest in Europe usually do better than polling predictions”, the spokesperson concluded.

As for the centre-right EPP group, Italy’s governing coalition partner Forza Italia is set to lose four seats from its current 9, as the party’s voters migrate to Meloni’s Fratelli d’Italia, while Ireland’s “Fine Gael” drops from 5 to 2 seats.

Meanwhile, the German Christian democrats (“CDU”) lose three seats, staying at 20, and its sister party CSU would also lose 1 seat, with the German EPP delegation as a whole reducing in total from 29 to 25 seats.

Spain’s Partido Popular (PP) would rise from 13 to 21 MEPs after winning the national snap elections in July.

Other wins for the EPP include Poland’s Koalicja Obywatelska, led by Donald Tusk, which rises from 11 to 16 seats (14 of which are allocated to EPP), and the appearance of the new party “Nieuw Social Contract” in the Netherlands ahead of national elections on 22 November, which scores record-breaking seven seats in its first entrance to the European Parliament by snatching votes from existing Dutch centre-right party “CDA”, going from five to one seat.

Citing the example of the national elections in Spain and the Netherlands, an EPP source told Euractiv that the reliability of national and EU polls should be questioned.

However, the same source added that "all estimates always agree on the same thing: the next Commission president will only be able to count on the same majority as now - EPP, S&D, Renew. There is no other possible, neither from the left nor from the right."

Despite efforts from some European parties to promote the spitzenkandidat system, whereby the lead candidate of the party that gathers a majority in the Parliament becomes European Commission President, EU countries will most likely end up making their own choice.

After the 2019 elections, for example, EPP's lead candidate Manfred Weber was overriden by the EU countries, which chose instead Ursula von der Leyen. In any case, the Parliament will have to consent.

Greens’ seats collapse with hopes to mobilise base

The Greens/EFA group is projected to attain 52 seats, signifying a notable decrease from their current 72. The most significant losses are in the Greens’ traditional strongholds, Germany and Austria, where they lost five and one seat respectively. While Italy’s Green Party loses its three seats and Belgium’s Ecolo loses one, France’s Europe Écologie Les Verts (EELV), Finland’s Vihreä liitto, Sweden’s “Miljöpartiet de gröna” and Ireland’s Green Party all lose 2 seats each.

At the same time, the party does win terrain in some countries, such as Croatia, where the party “Možemo!” enters the parliament for the first time with two seats, Lithuania, where the Greens/EFA score double the seats to reach four, and Spain, where the new coalition “Sumar” is providing green parties with the necessary political space to win two extra seats, to a total of three.

Despite this forecast, the Greens trust that their base and grassroots network will mobilise voters in the run-up to the elections, European Green Party co-chairs Mélanie Vogel and Thomas Waitz told EURACTIV, reminding of the 2019 EU elections when polls predicted the collapse of the Greens in the European Parliament, but which ultimately led to a “Green wave” and placed the Greens as the fourth group.

“We are ready for the campaign, working hard with NGOs, trade unions, businesses and civil society to develop more proposals for social and climate justice that preserve our environment and create quality jobs”, they said.

At the same time, the co-chairs also believe that extreme weather events over the past year will motivate people to vote for them, as the climate will be at the heart of their election campaign, and 77% of EU citizens believe that climate change is a ‘very serious problem’ according to June 2023 Eurobarometer.

“This summer’s record-breaking heatwaves and wildfires show people that voting green is crucial to get real climate action and protect our children’s and grandchildren’s generations”, they said.

As for “the mobilisation that saved the Nature Restoration Law, against a coalition of EPP, liberals and populist, and the Spanish elections in July, where the PP did not get to a majority with VOX, show that, together with citizens and civil society, we can win the political battles and defeat the right-wing parties,” they added.

Socialists and leftists undergo seat reshuffling

The Socialists and Democrats group (S&D) and the Left group stay where they are with a slight increase of three and one seats totalling 146 and 38 MEPs, respectively. However, they both undergo a reshuffling of their member parties and number of MEPs between national delegations.

Within S&D, the biggest winners are France’s Parti Socialiste and Romania’s Partidul Social Democrat, with both scoring five extra three from three to eight and from eight to 13, respectively.

Italy’s Partito Democratico scores four new seats, becoming the second largest national delegation with 19 and surpassing Germany’s SPD, which scores two extra seats but falls short by one MEP with 18 seats.

Spain’s governing PSOE earns one extra seat and remains S&D’s biggest national delegation with 21 MEPs.

The gains in the EU’s big countries are overshadowed by losses in smaller countries, such as Poland’s “Lewica”, Estonia’s “Sotsiaaldemokraatlik Erakond”, and Malta’s “Partit Laburista”, which all lose one seat.

In the Netherlands, the Labour party’s (“Partij van de Arbeid”) MEPs are halved, with only three seats left – not a good omen for former Commissioner Frans Timmermans, who resigned his post in August 2023 to head a joint list between the Dutch labour party and greens for the Netherland’s upcoming elections on 22 November.

As for the Left group, “La France Insoumise” would win two seats, from 5 to 7, while the biggest winner would be Ireland’s Sinn Féin, which would scale from one to six seats. Contrarily, some parties would lose seats, such as Ireland’s “Independents”, who would lose 2, while both Spain’s “Anticapitalistas” and Germany’s “Die Linke” would lose 1.

Spain’s left-wing coalition “Sumar”, which is both Green and Left, would score three seats for the Left group, one less from 2019, and 3 seats for the Greens. It remains to be seen where the coalition’s projected two unaffiliated seats would end up in.

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*Nine seats go to unaffiliated parties, including leftist coalition Sumar (Spain) with two seats and Course of Freedom (Greece), NIKI (Greece), Spartans (Greece), “DieBasis” (Germany), “Yes, Bulgaria”, and Stabilitātei! (Latvia) with one seat each.

**The Non-Inscrits, a group comprising many right-wing or far-right parties, is slated to ascend from 47 to 56 seats

*** One seat is unnamed due to the nature of the mass probability model (methodology).

(Max Griera and Tobias Gerhard Schminke | EURACTIV.com with EuropeElects)