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POLITICO’s 2024 Backhanded Awards
There has never been a more deserving set of “winners.”
By EDDY WAX
Illustration by Ellie Foreman-Peck for POLITICO
The Ursula von der Leyen Award for Not Being Charles Michel: António Costa
Charles Michel has left office with a unique legacy: He’s the only European Council president to have quit twice.
The former Belgian prime minister tried to flounce out of the presidency early to become a member of the European Parliament — only to quickly row back after receiving a strong rebuke from pretty much everyone.
After a chaotic tenure that will be most remembered for Michel’s petty feud with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, Brussels has breathed an audible sigh of relief at his replacement by António Costa.
It’s been noted that the former Portuguese prime minister’s arrival is a watershed for another reason. Costa is of Goan-Mozambican descent, making him the first person from an ethnic minority to lead a top European Union institution.
To be fair though, Michel is of Michel descent; his dad is also a Belgian politician, who served as foreign minister, European commissioner and member of the European Parliament. Technically, that counts as a minority too.
The Kim Jong Un Award for Empty Threats: Iratxe García
Iratxe García talks a good game. The leader of the Socialist delegation in the European Parliament spent the year huffing and puffing about the bedroom eyes her center-right rivals in the European People’s Party were making toward the far right.
Over and over again, García and her Socialist brethren threatened to walk away from the centrist majority supporting European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen unless their demands were met. And then they quietly caved and voted through whatever it was they were complaining about in the first place.
It got to the point that if you wanted to know what was going to happen next in Brussels, it was enough to read the latest Socialist press release announcing the party’s ironclad refusal to go along with some measure being proposed by the EPP.
First, there was the demand that Nicolas Schmit, the failed Socialist candidate for Commission president, be allowed to keep his job as commissioner. Schmit is currently unemployed.
Then there was the ultimate red line: The Socialists could not possibly support von der Leyen if Raffaele Fitto — Italian Prime Minister Georgia Meloni’s man in Brussels — was made one of the Commission president’s executive vice presidents.
After months of saber-rattling by García it only took a couple of days of pressure by the EPP on her preferred candidate Teresa Ribera for the Socialists to decide that capitulation was once again the better part of valor.
The Emmanuel Macron Two-Faced Award: Ursula von der Leyen
Emmanuel Macron is often mocked at home for his attempt to please both sides of the political spectrum, and ultimately leave everyone disgusted with him. The French president is the sun king of an “en même temps” — “at the same time” — style of politics.
These days, Queen Ursula is giving Macron a run for his money.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen — who rebranded herself as just “Ursula” during the European Parliament election — spent her first term positioning herself as the continent’s greenest politician. She rolled out the Green Deal as the centerpiece of her presidency, pushed through legislation to phase out the combustion engine by 2035 and introduced requirements for environmentally friendly initiatives for countries wanting to receive cash from the Commission’s pandemic recovery fund.
In her new incarnation, she’s struck a markedly different tone, jettisoning the green talk for slogans about competitiveness. Politically, she’s declined to woo the Greens, focusing her attention instead on Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s European Conservatives and Reformists Party, a faction that includes Polish Euroskeptics who want to trash the Green Deal.
But hey, it works! Her new team of commissioners was voted into office with a majority that included not just members of the ECR but, en même temps, even a healthy chunk of Greens.
The Sofagate Award for the Advancement of Women: Simon Harris
When European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen was seeking nominations to be part of her team of commissioners, she asked each EU government to give her two choices: a man and a woman.
Simon Harris was the first leader to refuse.
Harris, then the Irish prime minister, told reporters he would only nominate a man: Michael McGrath, who had already stepped down as finance minister to prepare for the job. That opened the floodgates for almost every national government to follow suit — and despite last-minute cajoling from von der Leyen, the new College of Commissioners will not be as gender balanced as she had hoped.
Harris, it turned out, wasn’t done ignoring women. While campaigning for the Irish election in County Cork, Harris was confronted by a woman called Charlotte Fallon who told him care workers in the disability sector like her had been “ignored” by the government. “No, you weren’t. That’s not true,” Harris said before walking away. He later had to offer a humiliating public apology.
The Nigel Farage Award for EU unity: Donald Trump
The last time the European Union had such a sense of common purpose it was thanks to Nigel Farage.
After the pint-swilling, cigarette-smoking Brexiteer-in-chief was finally ousted from the European Parliament — having pulled off his life’s achievement of wrenching the United Kingdom out of the EU — the rest of the bloc closed ranks and dominated London during the subsequent exit negotiations.
Enter Donald Trump.
Some in Brussels hope the incoming president will spur the EU to pull together again. His threats to abandon NATO allies could galvanize the bloc’s defense efforts. His promises of a trade war could spur countries to get serious about economic reforms. The reality of an ever more unstable world will force leaders to gather together under common positions.
Well, that’s the dream anyway. There’s a strong possibility Trump will have to hand back his award if, as many believe likely, the EU cracks rather than bands together under pressure.
The Neville Chamberlain Award for Peacemaking: Olaf Scholz
Instead of sending long-range missiles to Kyiv, Germany should ship the Ukrainians a few pallets of Angela Merkel’s new autobiography. After all, there can hardly be anything produced in Germany that’s more defensive than the former chancellor’s newly published tome.
In her book, which one hack described as “736 pages of unbearable self-righteousness,” Merkel barely addressed why she took such a soft line on Russian President Vladimir Putin even after he invaded Crimea and eastern Ukraine, ultimately emboldening him to try for the whole country, sparking a conflict that continues to roil Europe today.
At least Merkel didn’t have the benefit of hindsight. Even as missiles continue to fall on Kyiv, her successor Olaf Scholz is campaigning for reelection on what he describes as a prudent decision not to send long-range Taurus missiles to Ukraine. Who knows, maybe this time, Putin will finally be appeased.
