Conservative ECR now third group in EU Parliament, but Fidesz drops out

The European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) said on Wednesday (19 June) that they had leapfrogged the liberal Renew group as the third-biggest political group in the European Parliament after welcoming new parties, but Hungary’s ruling Fidesz abandoned the idea of joining them. 

The ECR has grown from 77 members to 83, the group announced. The new members include those from the Denmark Democrats party, the Bulgarian party ‘There is Such a People’, the Lithuanian Farmers and Greens Union party, French ex-Reconquête MEPs, and the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR). 

Later, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s party Fidesz announced on X that they would no longer seek to join ECR as they do not want to share a political family with Romania’s AUR due to “its extreme anti-Hungarian stance.”

With the new members, ECR now surpasses the 80-strong liberal Renew Europe group.

While Renew could also get additional seats in the coming days, as internal negotiations are still ongoing with parties such as Volt, it is clear that the Liberals and Conservatives are heading into a neck-and-neck race for the third most crucial top job in the European Union: the position of the EU’s chief diplomat.

In the latest projections, the job was set aside for Estonia’s liberal Prime Minister Kaja Kallas. However, if the hard-right conservatives remain in third place by the time all political groups are organised over the coming weeks, it may impact the nomination, as ECR will have more political weight. 

Following the continent-wide elections, politicians representing the three biggest political families in the European Parliament are expected to fill the top positions at the European Commission, European Council, and that of the chief diplomat.  

The first package proposed and discussed by the 27 EU leaders on Monday (17 June) included those from the centre-right EPP party, the Socialists, and the Liberals, respectively, or the so-called traditional ‘centrist majority’ that emerged after the EU elections.

Should the Conservatives overtake the Liberals in Parliament, they should, at least theoretically, be given a place in the trio.

The seat numbers in Parliament and majorities are also important as they will determine the number of votes the future European Commission President will receive.

Frontrunner candidate Ursula von der Leyen said she would first count on the EPP, Socialists and Liberals to ally, leaving out ECR – although she had opened the door to collaborating with them.

That said, the Socialists have been very clear they do not want to work with the Conservatives, making such nomination difficult.

Even if they end up as the fourth biggest group, just behind the the Liberals in terms of seat numbers, ECR-affiliated politicians are likely to ask for a bigger role in the next term of the EU institutional and political cycle. 

Giorgia Meloni, Italy’s prime minister and the main figure head of the hard-right movement in Europe, has until now kept her cards close to her chest and has not revealed what she wanted from the top-job negotiations. 

She, however, made clear during Monday’s dinner of EU leaders that she disapproved of the fact that her political family’s results in the elections, where they showed an important surge in seats, were not taken into account, Euractiv has learnt.

*Max Griera contributed to the reporting.

[Edited by Zoran Radosavljevic] 

Read more with Euractiv