More than 350 million people will be able to vote between 23 and 26 May to elect the new European Parliament (EP), the only institution directly elected by the citizens of the European Union. What’s at stake? What happens with Brexit?

2. The Europeans go to the polls
More than 350 million people will be able to vote between 23 and 26 May to elect the new European
Parliament (EP), the only institution directly elected by the citizens of the European Union.
Elections will be held throughout all 28 Member States… because the United Kingdom, considering that
the London Parliament is unlikely to ratify the Brexit agreement before this date, will have to participate.

3. THE EUROPEAN ELECTIONS

4. 27 46
Until the United Kingdom completes the process of withdrawing from the EU, the 751 seats in the European Parliament
will continue to be allocated among the Member States as they were during the 2014-2019 legislature.
However, once Brexit takes effect, those MEPs will all go home and there will only be 705 seats.
Of the UK’s 73 seats
What happens with Brexit?
will be reserved for the new Countries
that may become members of the EU in
the future.
will be re-assigned to 14 Countries
that were previously underrepresented,
including France, Italy and Spain.

5. What’s at stake?
The elections will help set out the future direction of the EU
and the laws governing the bloc, and they will be taking place at
a crucial time.
Brexit has caused nationalist and anti-EU groups to flare up all
over Europe, many of which see the elections as a referendum
on whether the EU will survive or not.
The rifts in the bloc between east and west, north and south are
getting deeper and deeper; and the EU is still dealing with the
aftermath of the 2015 migration crisis and the subsequent surge
in the far right.

6. What do the polls say?
Although the EPP and the S&D should continue to be the largest
groups in the EP, they could lose the absolute majority that
together they have held on to over the last 25 years.
According to polls,
will increase its numbers –
probably not enough to lead the
EP, but enough to cause a stir
in the workings of the EU.
THE FAR RIGHT
are struggling in France,
Italy, German and the
Netherlands.
the moderate conservatives
are at a disadvantage due to the rise in the number
of Eurosceptics and the far right throughout the EU after
years of austerity and problems managing migration flows.
THE SOCIALISTS

7. THE EUROPEan PARLIAMENT

8. The main roles of the European Parliament are:
What does IT do?
passing the EU laws together with
the Council of the European Union
– presided over by ministers from
Member States’ governments;
supervising the European
Commission and the expenses
of the EU Budget (about € 145
billion each year).

9. There are currently eight political groups in the European
Parliament that go from the main forces of the centre-right
and centre-left to anti-EU alliances.
• European People’s Party (EPP)
• Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats in the
European Parliament (S&D)
• European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR)
• Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe (ALDE)
Political groups
• European United Left/Nordic Green Left (GUE/NGL)
• The Greens/European Free Alliance (G/EFA)
• Europe of Freedom and Direct Democracy (EFDD)
• Europe of Nations and Freedom (ENF)
According to the rules of the EP, a group must be
made up of at least 25 MEPs from at least seven
Member States.

10. the President of the European Commission

11. MEPs will also be deciding, along with the governments of the EU Member States, who will take over for Jean-Claude Juncker
as the President of the European Commission. The term of the incumbent European Commission lapses on 31 October 2019.
Some groups have already decided to present their candidate for President of the Commission, the Spitzenkandidaten.
Jan Zahradil
(ECR)
Frans Timmermans
(S&D)
Ska Keller e Bas Eickhout
(The Greens)
Manfred Weber
(EPP)
Team Europe
a 9-member directorate
(ALDE) that will decide their
candidate after the elections,
also in light of Macron’s
Renaissance movement
entering the field.
THE ELECTION

12. PROS
The system of the Spitzenkandidat, or lead candidate, was tested for the first time in 2014 and led to Juncker’s election.
How does it work? The candidate from the parliamentary group with a relative majority – or the one agreed on by the groups to
build a majority – has to convince a qualified majority of the EU Heads of State and Government, the European Council.
THE Spitzenkandidat…
the candidate is essentially forced upon the
Council and on the Parliament through a decision-
making process led by the parties, or better yet,
by the parliamentary groups after the elections.
rather than leaving the choice of the European Commission
President up to the EU leaders, to the highly criticised
European Council, after the elections, this mechanism
engages the large pan-European political groups, which
each choose their top candidate before the vote.
COnS

13. The 2019 elections will probably be more complicated for
those who backed the Spitzenkandidat mechanism five years
ago since today they are politically weaker: the main centre-
right and centre-left parties are unlikely to succeed in gaining a
majority in Parliament.
Building a coalition in the next European Parliament will
potentially be more challenging, and the EP may not agree on
insisting that a Spitzenkandidat to be selected.
Not to mention that some Heads of State, like Macron, have
leaked their disagreement with this method.
… or an agreement between the
groups after the elections?

14. The political order of the EP and the balance of power between
national governments after the European elections will also
influence other essential institutional appointments:
novembER 2019: the term of the President of the European
Council, Polish Donald Tusk, will come to an end.
31 oCtobER 2019: the term of the President of the European
Central Bank, Italian Mario Draghi, will also be up.
Both of these roles are elected by the European Council (so by
the Member States’ governments) via qualified majority voting, or
rather, 55% of the Member States (16), representing at least 65%
of the European population.
A barrage of appointments in 2019

15. It is unlikely that an Italian will be elected to one of the top positions in the European
institutions.
The political gap between the Conte government and the moderate bloc led by France
and Germany will make it virtually impossible for the Member States to agree on an
Italian for one of the three presidents that will be newly elected in 2019 (the
Commission, the Council and the ECB – the latter also because of the system of
national rotation).
Nevertheless, Italy is likely to manage to get appointed as a European Commissioner
on an important matter, if anything because it is one of the Founding Countries.
The President of the Commission, and the European Parliament, however, enjoy broad
decision-making power and it may be difficult for Italy to negotiate an Italian to be
appointed as Commissioner handling a relevant portfolio.
AND ITALY?

16. Telos Analisi & Strategie
Palazzo Doria Pamphilj
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