The 2019 EP Elections across Europe

The 2019 EP Elections across Europe

The 2019 EP Elections across Europe

  Introduction On May 17, 2019, the campaign for the European Parliament election 2019 came to an abrupt halt in Austria. That evening, the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung and the German magazine Der Spiegel released a video that resulted in one of the biggest national political scandals in Austrian history, now known as “Ibiza-gate”. In the video – secretly recorded shortly before the national election in 2017 – the FPÖ-party leader Heinz-Christian Strache and deputy leader Johann Gudenus revealed modes of illegally funding the FPÖ, promising government orders at inflated prices to a purported niece of a Russian oligarch in a...

  Introduction Contrary to the general European trend, the Maltese Labour Party won the European election held on the 25 May by a comfortable majority and took four of the six European parliament seats allotted to Malta. In 2014 it had also won a majority of votes, but only three seats (Carammia and Pace, 2015). The opposition Nationalist Party failed to arrest its electoral decline whose roots go back to 2004, but won the other two seats. As in the previous three European elections the Europhile parties won more than 96% of the valid votes cast. This is consistent with...

Introduction Romania organized elections for the European Parliament (EP) for the third time since joining the European Union (EU) in 2007. This time the elections overlapped with Romania holding the six-month rotating Presidency of the EU. During this Presidency, Romania organized different meetings with representatives of the member states, intensively covered by national media. As a result, the European agenda became more visible in the public debate, the peak being reached during the informal summit of heads of state or government of the EU organized in Sibiu to discuss the EU strategic agenda for the post-election period. Political context Romania is regularly...

The 2019 European Parliament election in Ireland was notable in many ways. First, we saw the main party in government improving on its performance in 2014 (when it was also in government) and on its 2016 general election vote. Fine Gael won 30 per cent of the vote (up 7 points), and will send 5 EPP MEPs to Brussels in the Irish complement of 11(13). (Ireland has 11 seats, but this will rise to 13 if the UK leaves the EU.) A second feature was a notable increase in support for the Green Party, now apparently forgiven for its participation...

26 May 2019 saw an election paradox in Hungary: a long-serving government won big on a record-high turnout, yet the winners looked frustrated and the losers positively re-charged. Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz-KDNP electoral alliance took well over 52% of the popular vote and 62% of the country’s 21 seats in the European Parliament. That is one seat and one percent of the vote up compared to the 2014 EP elections, and just one seat and four percent of the vote less than their all-time best in 2009. But Fidesz’ leaders appeared disappointed and the government shortly announced unexpected...