The vote of no confidence against Commission President Ursula von der Leyen failed on Thursday, as mainstream and progressive political groups lined up behind her despite the clear controversies surrounding ‘Pfizergate’. During the vote in the European Parliament, 553 MEPs cast their votes out of a total of 720. Of those, 175 supported the motion of no confidence against the president, while 360 voted against it, and 18 abstained.

The European People’s Party (EPP), Socialists and Democrats (S&D), the Greens, Renew, and the Left collectively voted in support of von der Leyen, although not every MEP was present. Some members of the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) also voted against the motion. Patriots for Europe (PfE) and Europe of Sovereign Nations (ESN) voted in favour of the motion. Hungarian opposition leader Péter Magyar, an MEP from the Respect and Freedom (Tisza) party affiliated with the EPP, abstained, while two of Tisza’s MEPs voted in support of von der Leyen. Meanwhile, ten out of eleven MEPs from the Hungarian governing coalition Fidesz–KDNP voted against the president, with one abstention.

The motion of censure was initiated by Romanian MEP Gheorghe Piperea, primarily over ‘Pfizergate’, a potentially significant corruption scandal involving the Commission president. During Monday’s debate on the motion, von der Leyen dismissed the scandal as a ‘conspiracy theory’—despite the EU’s General Court ruling to the contrary—and characterized the motion as a ‘far-right plot’ to remove her from power and destabilize democratic institutions.

Last Chance

Despite the motion’s failure, the existence of such a procedure has dealt significant damage to both von der Leyen’s and the Commission’s reputation. During Monday’s debate, it became clear that neither the left nor the right wings of the European Parliament are satisfied with how the EU’s executive branch operates. The Greens, Renew, S&D, and the Left criticized von der Leyen and the EPP for siding with right-wing groups on issues such as climate and green policies.

The day before the vote of no confidence, von der Leyen was forced to make concessions to secure the support of the left, promising to grant more powers to the regions in the EU’s next budget, which the Commission will present next week. Altogether, this significantly restricts both the Commission’s and the EPP’s political manoeuvring space, as they will now need to align more closely with the left in order to maintain support. According to POLITICO Brussels, many progressive MEPs described the vote as ‘an absolute last chance’ for von der Leyen. With the European Parliament increasingly shifting to the right, there is a possibility that more motions of no confidence could be initiated against von der Leyen in the future, as noted by Piperea as well.

On the eve of the vote, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán—a staunch critic of von der Leyen—posted a mocking photo of the Commission president with the caption ‘Time to go’. In a separate post, Orbán noted that it is not only Pfizergate that makes von der Leyen unsuitable for her position but several other issues as well. ‘It is about competence, results, and the future of Europe,’ Orbán stated, listing areas where he believes von der Leyen has failed, including competitiveness, the energy crisis, handling illegal migration, and her stance on the war in Ukraine. ‘Madame President, leadership means accountability. It is time to go,’ Orbán concluded.

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