The Right is Being Shut Out of Government Across Europe

Right-wing politicians are being shut out of Government across Europe, says Gavin Mortimer in the Spectator, as so-called ‘progressive’ elites in politics and the judiciary effectively rig what are supposed to be democratic elections. Here’s an excerpt.

Alarm grew as opinion polls indicated [Calin] Georgescu would win the second round [of Romania’s Presidential election]. Something had to be done, and it was. A couple of days before the decisive vote, Romania’s Constitutional Court annulled the first round because of alleged Russian interference. The court had perused some declassified intelligence documents that claimed 800 TikTok accounts had been activated shortly before polls opened. There was no evidence of voting irregularities in the election itself but the fact Russia had been active on social media was enough for the court to intervene.

At the time, Georgescu likened himself to Donald Trump: an anti-system candidate who was the target of Establishment ‘lawfare’. The Trump administration has subsequently cited Georgescu as an example of the EU’s creeping illiberalism.

In a speech at last month’s Munich Security Conference, Vice-President J.D. Vance expressed his astonishment “that a former European Commissioner went on television recently and sounded delighted that the Romanian Government had just annulled an entire election… these cavalier statements are shocking to American ears”.

The Commissioner in question was Frenchman Thierry Breton, who in a television interview in January boasted that “We did it in Romania and we will obviously do it in Germany if necessary”. He was referring to the upcoming German election and the possibility that the Right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) might win.

As it turned out, simply annulling Romania’s Presidential election didn’t derail the Georgescu bandwagon. Quite the opposite. He picked up momentum and polls showed that he would romp to victory in May’s re-run election. As I predicted in January, Romania’s elite wouldn’t allow this to happen.

And they haven’t. At the end of February, Georgescu was detained by police as he drove through Bucharest to file his candidacy in the election. He was indicted on six counts, among them false funding sources and false information in his last campaign. He was also barred from leaving the country and creating any new social media accounts.

Now he is barred from standing for President, a decision he has called a “direct blow to the heart of democracy worldwide”.

It’s part of a disturbing illiberal pattern, says Gavin. In Germany, the AfD came second on 20% of the vote but has been shut out of Government in favour of the Left-wing Social Democrats, despite having had their worst performance since 1945. In Austria, the anti-immigration Freedom Party won the election last October but still finds itself shunned by the other parties who have colluded to keep it side-lined.

And in France on March 31st a court will rule whether Marine Le Pen will be barred from office for five years over a charge of “misusing EU funds”.

This doesn’t end well. The issues that these politicians represent – and simmering public anger about them – obviously aren’t going away, least of all while Left-wing parties cling to power despite losing elections and refuse to address them.

Worth reading in full.