Socialists nominate Frans Timmermans for European Commission president

Party leaders proclaim ‘spring is coming’ for the Continent’s progressives, but they continue to face their lowest-ever poll numbers.

MADRID — European Socialists kicked off their 2019 European Parliament election campaign on Saturday by officially nominating Frans Timmermans — currently second in command at the European Commission — for the top job, and framing their campaign for European Parliament seats around a “new social contract.”

Flanked by giant red billboards, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez and Timmermans wore jeans as they danced to “Bella Ciao” a favored song about the Italian World War II resistance, while other leading members of the center left payed homage to Timmermans, who ran unopposed after the withdrawal of his Commission colleague Maroš Šefčovič from the race in November.

The European election season is now set to move into high gear, with Manfred Weber, the European People’s Party candidate for Commission president to officially launch his campaign in early March.

While the Socialist campaign manifesto attacked the “dangerous delusions” of nationalists and promised a “change of leadership and policy direction, leaving behind the neoliberal and conservative models of the past,” the party faces an uphill battle in 2019.  

Timmermans has taken on many of the highest-profile files — including controversial approaches to migration and rule of law — handled by the current Commission, led by the center-right Jean-Claude Juncker, and may struggle to separate himself from that legacy.

In overall terms, the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats — the European Parliament group of the Party of European Socialists (PES) — is on course to win only 132 seats out of 705 in the next European Parliament, on the back of just 20 percent of the EU-wide vote. It has currently 186 seats out of 751 MEPs in the Parliament.

Poland’s new progressive sensation Robert Biedroń used an appearance to proclaim that “spring is coming” for progressive forces around the EU, but in countries like France, the Socialists are in particularly dire straits, polling at only around 5 percent, and would be wiped out altogether if they fail to clear the 5 percent threshold.

The party of European Socialists is also outnumbered by their rivals, conservative European People’s Party (EPP) and the liberal ALDE party, at EU summit tables.

In private, Socialist officials say they are hopeful they had can add to their summit caucus ranks by winning national elections in Finland in April and Denmark several weeks later.

“We all know that we are challenged, our values are challenged,” said Stefan Löfven, Sweden’s Socialist prime minister, in Madrid.

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Udo Bullmann, the European Parliament Socialist group leader urged “a social revolution to save our planet, to give our society a decent future.”

In his congress speech, Timmermans put a strong emphasis on traditional left-wing battles, pledging for a “strong alliance with Europe’s trade unions,” “decent pay for decent work,” a fair taxation system, a closer cooperation with Africa and the need to fight the “shortage of affordable housing in Europe.”

He also said one of his landmark projects as future Commission president would be a “ban on gender-based violence.”