Von der Leyen breaks silence, faces skepticism from MEPs

Ursula von der Leyen’s drive to get the European Parliament behind her nomination for the top job in Brussels hit a wall of skepticism on Wednesday, including calls to delay her ratification vote, currently scheduled for next week.

The German defense minister met with Socialists and liberal MEPs — the two largest groups after her own conservative European People’s Party — and was due to meet with the Greens, the fourth largest group, later in the afternoon.

Although von der Leyen has had plenty of photo opportunities since being tapped last week by EU leaders to take over from Jean-Claude Juncker as president of the European Commission, she had avoided any utterance on actual policy — until Wednesday.

Speaking to liberal-centrist MEPs from the Renew Europe group, in a session that was broadcast live, she stuck to the already familiar script of stressing her personal connection to Brussels (she was born in the EU capital and went to school there). But when she ran through a litany of major issues facing the EU, she put particular emphasis on climate change, calling it urgent and appearing to scale up the ambition of Europe’s response.

“The clock is ticking,” she said.

On the demise of the Spitzenkandidat (lead candidate) system — which was supposed to bring extra democracy and transparency to the selection of Juncker’s successor including months of campaigning and public debates, but came apart at the hands of EU leaders — von der Leyen said: “I can’t heal the past, it is a fact.” She added:  “I will do everything so we develop a process that is more mature.”

The Socialists are bitterly disappointed that EU leaders rejected a slate that included their own candidate for the top job, Frans Timmermans. Many Social Democrat MEPs, including some of her fellow Germans, said that they would not support her candidacy. They complained that she is too vague on policy ideas and her personal convictions, and didn’t make a sufficiently convincing case to justify a rushed vote next week.

German Social Democrat MEP Katarina Barley, a former justice minister who served with von der Leyen in Angela Merkel’s Cabinet, said she knows the nominee “very well personally but I don’t know her ideas about Europe.” Two hours is not enough to decide on the top job, she said, and about 40 questions went unanswered for lack of time, Barley said. “That’s why we support the [lead candidate] process, because you need a whole election campaign.”

Unlike Juncker, who had spent nearly two decades coming to Brussels as prime minister of Luxembourg, as a leader of the Eurogroup and member of the European Council before securing the Commission presidency via the Spitzenkandidat process, von der Leyen could not describe any personal history in EU policy, beyond her personal links to Brussels.

In her remarks to MEPs, she made some brief references to her record as defense minister before moving on to describing her support for the EU’s single market, and her goal of achieving gender parity in Commission personnel.

Renew Europe appeared more inclined to support her nomination than the Socialists, in large part because the liberals claimed a major prize — the European Council presidency for Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel — in the leadership package put forward by the Council.

But Dacian Cioloş, the leader of Renew Europe, said after the meeting that his group’s vote would depend on four conditions: von der Leyen’s willingness to take direction from a proposed conference on the future of Europe, agreement to allow transnational candidate lists in future European elections, support for a new “rule-of-law” mechanism, and a commitment that liberal lead candidate Margrethe Vestager would be given a vice presidency post equal in rank to that of Socialist lead candidate Timmermans.

Cioloş also said the group is concerned about allegations of mismanagement and overspending at the German defense ministry during von der Leyen’s tenure as minister and that he had asked her in a previous meeting to clarify the situation.

“Of course, integrity, it’s a key issue for us,” he said.

Dutch liberal MEP Sophie in ’t Veld complained von der Leyen had offered “not a lot that was very precise and concrete on rule of law” while other liberals echoed the Socialists’ complaints about the end of the lead candidate process.

Still others in Renew Europe raised a question about the portfolio that would be given to Vestager, who has been tapped for a senior Commission vice presidency. Fredrick Federley, a Swedish liberal, reminded von der Leyen that leaders on the Council had promised Vestager such a senior post.

Von der Leyen did not state what portfolio Vestager would receive but said the Dane, currently the competition commissioner, “will have an outstanding position because she did an outstanding work.”

She added: “We are absolutely like-minded.”

The Council’s leadership package also named Spanish Foreign Minister Josep Borrell for the post of high representative of foreign affairs, and an Italian Social Democrat, David Sassoli, was elected last week as Parliament president after the Council made clear it wanted a Socialist in that post. But those jobs were not enough to quell the outrage over Timmermans, currently first vice president of the Commission, being blocked from the top job.

Iratxe Garcia, the Spanish leader of the Socialist group in Parliament, said her MEPs would discuss von der Leyen’s candidacy further and aimed to arrive at a common position on whether to back her by early next week.

But some of the Socialist MEPs, including Jens Geier, the head of the German delegation, said their minds are made up — and von der Leyen would not get their votes.

“She is not concrete,” said Raphaël Glucksmann, a new French Socialist MEP. “She’s not concrete on migration questions. She’s not concrete on social rights.” He added, “On substance, we’re absolutely not there yet.”

Then, turning to some officials standing with him in the hallway outside the meeting room, Glucksmann quipped: “You could have briefed her.”

This article has been updated.