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No, Ursula von der Leyen says, no promises were made to the governments of Poland, Hungary or Italy to secure votes from those countries' members in the European Parliament. No special posts in her commission, no financial promises in the next multi-year budget, nothing like that. "Wishes have been formulated," she says, straightening out her pink cardigan, "but there can only be definitive promises when the entire tableau is complete." [...]
Von der Leyen is the first German to occupy the post in over 50 years. And she is taking over the top job in turbulent times. For now, the United Kingdom is still slated to leave the EU on Oct. 31. Coincidentally, von der Leyen will officially start her new position in Brussels the next day.
But the EU is also divided, as the very close result in her election showed: 383 of 747 members of parliament voted for her as their choice for the new European Commission president. That's only nine more votes than she needed to get the job. Rarely has a commission head been elected by such a slim margin. On top of that, von der Leyen needed votes from representatives with Poland's Law and Justice Party (PiS) to secure her win, which raises the question of reciprocation.
Building Bridges
Von der Leyen is promising that the EU will reboot the relationship with Eastern Europe. "We need to overcome this division," she says. [...]
Von der Leyen wants the commission to regularly report on the state of the rule of law in each member country. "The examination of questions relating to rule of law needs to become more of a normality for us," she says on the plane. "We are all constantly struggling to achieve that ideal." [...]
A Vague Direction
Even though her speech was sprinkled with initiatives and plans, a "Green Deal" on climate protection and several pushes for greater equality for women, von der Leyen remains a blank page when it comes to European policy. Where does she want to lead the EU?
There is, for example, the question of whether the EU should move forward with the accession of new members. When she gets close to the answer, von der Leyen refers to her experience as defense minister. For 20 years, the Bundeswehr has been deployed to Kosovo, and in her job, Leyen cultivated contacts to the countries in the Western Balkans that the European Commission recently suggested could join the union starting in 2025. [...]
Von der Leyen knows, of course, that she owes her job to the EU leaders, who surprisingly nominated her for the Commission presidency after over 50 hours of consultation. Ultimately, she was nominated unanimously (only Germany had to abstain because of the opposition of the Social Democrats). It's a base of support she can build on.
Her slim majority in the parliament can also be traced back to a feat of strength by those EU leaders. Aside from Merkel, Pedro Sánchez from Spain and Antonio Costa of Portugal, called for members of parliament to vote for her. [...]