Ursula von der Leyen's second term in office: A setback that means more centralism, even more dirigisme and less freedom for Europe

The majority of the European Parliament, made up of the Liberals, the Greens and the Socialists, but also the European People's Party and parts of the ECR, has confirmed Ursula von der Leyen's candidature for a second term as President of the European Commission.

The “Patriots for Europe”-Group has of course spoken out against the reappointment of Ursula von der Leyen as Commission President.

Under her leadership, legal and massive illegal immigration to Europe has exploded, jeopardising our identity and security. The asylum and migration pact, which aims to distribute migrants among our countries, will exacerbate this migration catastrophe.

Under Ursula von der Leyen, there will be more and more punitive ecological tariffs at the expense of our citizens' purchasing power and more free trade agreements with the whole world that jeopardise our food sovereignty and our farmers.

In addition, yesterday's European Court of Justice ruling on the vaccine contracts made it clear that the public was not sufficiently informed about the details of the contracts by the Commission - although Mrs von der Leyen always talks about transparency. All of von der Leyen's secrecy surrounding her text messages with Pfizer boss Bourla in the run-up to a 35 billion Euro vaccine procurement is still unclear.

The MEPs of "Patriots for Europe", the main opposition force in the European Parliament, have committed themselves to fight as far as possible against decisions that are harmful to all the nations and peoples of Europe in the EU.We, who represent 18 million voters from different Member States, will defend a Europe that respects the sovereignty of nations and protects the identity and security of its citizens.