Left-wing newspaper Libération has revealed that Marine Le Pen’s Rassemblement National (RN) will not sit alongside the Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) in the European Parliament after the European elections on June 9th. They cite statements by the German national conservative party aimed at rehabilitating members of the SS during the Second World War.
For several weeks, relations had been strained between the two formations of the national Right which both sit together in the European Parliament in the Identity and Democracy (ID) group. The RN had previously distanced itself after a controversy sparked by comments attributed to the AfD on the issue of ‘remigration.’ Several meetings and media clarifications were necessary between the two parties to maintain contact—which had become increasingly difficult.
But this time is the last straw: “We will no longer sit with them during the next mandate,” announced RN party president Jordan Bardella’s campaign director, Alexandre Loubet, in the French newspaper Libération on Tuesday, May 21st.
The leadership of the French party condemned the latest statements on the subject of the SS made by Maximilian Krah, head of the AfD list for the June 9th European elections, in an interview with the Italian newspaper La Repubblica published on Saturday, May 18th. “I would never say that anyone who wore an SS uniform was automatically a criminal,” said the MEP, pointing to the example of Günter Grass, a former Nobel Prize winner for literature and member of the Waffen-SS. “Among the 900,000 SS, there were also many peasants: there was certainly a high percentage of criminals, but not only that,” added Maximilian Krah.
Who will go where?
Following these statements, several questions remain unanswered.
How will the two parties now divide themselves up within the European Parliament? Will the RN leave the Identity and Democracy group, and if so, where will it go? It seems hard to imagine it joining the ECR group (European Conservatives and Reformists), where, if it were successful in the elections, its implacable rival, the Reconquête party led by Éric Zemmour with Marion Maréchal at the head of its list, would sit. The RN could join the Non-attached Members, but this would considerably weaken its image. The AfD has not yet announced its future strategy.
Second question: how will Reconquête respond? During the remigration controversy, Éric Zemmour’s party came to the AfD’s rescue, claiming to share the German party’s vision and programme. This time, the comments reported in the Italian press will be harder to defend. On X, some Reconquête supporters are already criticising the RN’s attitude, which they see as a further compromise guided by an obsession with sanitising the RN’s image.
