Why the far right is surging in Europe

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Once-fringe parties are gaining power in Brussels

The European Parliament has been a coalition of centre-left and centre-right delegates for decades. But elections in June could deliver more far right MEPs than ever before. Their success could influence EU policy on everything from immigration to agriculture and the energy transition.

Migration and asylum, carbon emissions reductions, there's almost no area of policy making that isn't covered to some degree by EU legislation. What might happen after the election is that Renew, which are the liberals, could lose some seats and become the fourth biggest group, possibly, instead of the third. And then that brings in the ECR or the ID as a potential partner.

We have listened. We have acted and we have delivered on one of the main concerns of people across Europe. Geert Wilders, the far-right, anti-Islam firebrand did extraordinarily well in national elections in the Netherlands. On the other hand, you could take a country like Spain, where the Vox party, its rise has been inspired much more by the rise of Catalan separatism than by anti-immigrant feeling.

For Le Pen, that contrast is quite stark. She's still outsider and trying to climb that last bit of the stairs. The Rassemblement National, under the Le Pen leadership, has been through this process of trying to normalise themselves. In French they call it dédiabolisation which literally means to detoxify the party. Everything they do has to be seen through that lens. They're trying to prove to voters that they can govern and that they're ready.

Over the years that I've covered them, they've become more right wing, more tainted by this sort of far-right ideology. And that makes them fascinating as a sort of case study. I'm really not a fan of AfD or things like that, but the energy building law, I call it like this. It really has been a own goal.

Not everyone can instal it in their house. Maybe the owners are even too old, no bank will give them a credit, and things like that. With this politics, they will build so many fears inside of the people. What we've seen in recent weeks is that the Greens have really become a casualty of this sort of widespread anger at government policies. There have been extraordinary scenes where there's been so much disruption by protesters that Green politicians have had to cut short their public appearances and almost take shelter from the angry crowds.

 

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