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BERLIN — She wants five more years.
After months of speculation, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced her bid to become the lead candidate of the center-right European People’s Party (EPP) for the upcoming European elections in June.
Von der Leyen made the announcement during a press conference at an event from her center-right Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party in Berlin on Monday.
This puts her in prime position to snatch a second term at the helm of the EU’s powerful executive arm, focusing on a platform of increased defence spending.
The former German defense minister was instrumental in showcasing the EU’s continued support to Ukraine at it sought to fend off Russia’s full-scale invasion, with numerous trips to the country’s capital.
Through thick and thin, the Commission’s first female chief has steered the bloc through a worldwide pandemic and the first major conflict on European soil in decades.
It was also during her term that EU leaders decided to politically open accession talks with Kyiv last December, on her Commission’s recommendation.
A close ally to former Chancellor Angela Merkel, von der Leyen can be considered the most powerful Commission chief since Jacques Delors, a giant of European politics who died in December and is widely credited for engineering the bloc’s internal market.
Despite her undeniable capacity to act decisively in times of hardship, the former German minister’s iron-fist leadership style has sometimes put her at odds with EU capitals, whose support she will need to secure a second term. Still she is likely to gain support from the European Council. Only Hungary has been openly critical about her leadership.
On a range of sensitive topics, from her support to Israel in its war against Hamas to her China policy, she made decisions without consulting member states, sparking ire from EU diplomats — and her own commissioners — forced to play catch-up.
The so-called Pfizergate scandal, a reference to the texts she exchanged with the pharmaceutical giant’s CEO Albert Bourla to strike an enormous vaccine deal in 2021, has similarly tarnished her first term. It has led to a lawsuit from the New York Times against the Commission, for its failure to provide access to these texts.
Although attention to this case has so far been limited to Brussels circles, a court is still expected to rule on the legal battle in 2024. Politically, an unfavorable ruling would send an embarrassing signal and could have major implications for her reelection bid.
Von der Leyen will have to be formally nominated as her party’s lead candidate, or Spitzenkandidat. This will take place in a vote at the EPP’s electoral congress in Bucharest, Romania on March 6-7.
But she remains the frontrunner to preside over the European Commission for another five years.
And there could be more trouble coming her way. To secure a second term in office, von der Leyen needs to be nominated by European leaders and confirmed by the European Parliament in a public vote.
In 2019, she was backed in Parliament by a coalition of the conservative European People’s Party, the Socialists and the liberal Renew group.
But this only gave her a slim nine-vote majority, with 383 votes. With the predicted rise of the far-right in the next elections, there is no telling whether the three-party coalition would have enough votes to back her again.
In the meantime, von der Leyen will have to walk a delicate tightrope. If she is confirmed as the EPP’s lead candidate in March, she will be the first sitting Commission president to run for another term as Spitzenkandidat since the system was first implemented in the 2014 European elections.
This means she will have to abide by a set of rules that govern campaigning for EU office while remaining a Commission official, which could prove a perilous balancing act.
According to the campaign rules for Commissioners Von der Leyen herself set forth in January, she will have to set up separate social media accounts, clearly distinguish between statements made as a Commissioner and as a candidate, and will not be able to use any resources from the Commission for campaign purposes.
She will have to do all of this, while keeping her day job as the most powerful woman in Europe.
