European Parliament Election: May 23-26, 2019

[Diouf]

STEM/Mark poll of Czechia.
In usual Czech ways, a normal poll is not enough, so this shows both first and second preferences (if chosen). ANO in the lead but not near the lead in national polls, with Pirates the biggest competitor. SPD has been polling below 10% in all other polls, but rise up to 14% here. It will be a tight dance around the 5% threshold. KCSM, CSSD and KDU-CSL just above it here, while Pavel Telička's new HLAS party is just below. Telička was ANO's lead candidate in 2014, and currently vice-president of the EP. 11% for ODS would be a quite bad result for spitzenkandidat Jan Zahradil, despite it being an improval of the horrible 7.6% in 2014.

[Tender Branson]

Tonight, the first of 4 elephant debates between the 6 frontrunners will take place on PULS 4 TV:



Katerina Anastasiou (Communist Party) is not invited to the debates, as the KPÖ is not represented in the national or EU parliament.

Pollster OGM will do a live debate survey of who won and who did best on certain topics.

The debate just ended and the OGM poll results about the debate winner will come soon.

I think that Gamon (NEOS) and Kogler (Greens) did really well - as did Voggenhuber (Europe Now) surprisingly.

Vilimsky and Schieder were average, Karas (ÖVP) kinda weak and constantly under attack.

https://twitter.com/puls4/status/1127655285227708419?s=21

[Tender Branson]

Vilimsky (FPÖ) has won all 3 debate clusters shown so far, according to the OGM debate poll.

Gamon (NEOS) also very strong. Kogler (Greens) very strong in the climate cluster, but beaten by the FPÖ candidate ...

[Tender Branson]

Vilimsky/Voldemort (FPÖ) has won the debate by a big margin, says OGM.



But Gamon has won young voters (16-29 years) with 28% !

https://twitter.com/yvicathe/status/1127665333316276226?s=21

[Tender Branson]

It should be noted that the FPÖ as the only EU-critical party has a monopoly among the 7 parties on the ballot this year. The other 6 are all pro-EU. And some 33% of Austrians can be described as EU-sceptical.

[Tender Branson]

Debate polls are often a bit shady though and hardly predict the eventual winner, as Presidents Hillary Clinton and Norbert Hofer can tell us (they won every single debate poll).

[Former President tack50]

GAD3 poll for the EU elections in Spain

PSOE: 30.3%
PP: 18.5%
Cs: 16.6%
UP: 11.4%
Vox: 7.8%

Ahora Repúblicas (ERC+Bildu+BNG): 5.0%
Lliures per Europa (JxCat's Puigdemont list): 3.0%
CEUS (PNV+CC): 1.6%
PACMA: 1.1%

[Ethelberth]

PNV is holding its conventional EP seat.

[Diouf]

Another Danish Norstat poll for JP & Altinget. The best result for Conservatives in any EP poll, and a quite clear seat for them here. I am quite surprised as there haven't been much pointing towards an uptick in the party's fortunes. They have a lot of posters and commercials for the EP compared to other parties, but they have had them for a while now, and I'm not sure that it will make a that much of a difference. And they mainly just use the line that it would be valuable for Denmark to have a seat in EPP. Lead candidate Pernille Weiss has not impressed, and if anyone has heard of her, it is probably for saying that the she think EU could take 10 million africans in to fill up the labour gap. A statement which the party leadership of course hit down immediately, and she was forced to retract it ("a misunderstanding").

Social Democrats 24.4% 3 seats (4 if UK leave)
SPP 8.1% 1 seat

Liberals 18.6% 3 seats
Conservatives 6.8% 1 seat
Liberal Alliance 3.1% 0 seats

DPP 14.8% 2 seats

Red-Green Alliance 6.8% 1 seat
People's Movement against EU 6.3% 1 seat

Social Liberals 8.7% 1 seat
Alternative 2.5% 0 seats

[Tender Branson]

Austrians by a huge margin want to remain in the EU, think the country has benefitted from EU membership, but want more sovereignity over certain topics (according to the big Heute/ATV/Profil poll):

"Are you for or against an Auxit ? + by party."

22% for Auxit
73% against



"Has the EU membership benefitted Austria or not ? + by party."

58-30 Yes



"In the next years, the EU should [...] ? + by party."

21% transform into a United States of Europe
23% stay as it is right now
46% allow member countries more sovereignity over certain topics again

[Mike88]

BASTA! coalition leader, André Ventura, put his place in the hands of his coalition partners after he skipped a debate on RTP in order to be discussing football in another channel:

André Ventura has asked the parties that make up his BASTA! coalition, if they still have confidence in him after many supporters and fundraisers were piss off by his decision to skip a debate on RTP about the election in order to be on CMTV discussing football. Nonetheless, it seems that all parties and movements will vote in favour of Ventura's continuity as leader of the coalition.

Also Pedro Marques, PS main candidate, has become viral in the last few days on social media for putting himself in weird and embarrassing situations:

Here, he's talking to some children in Guarda city...
https://twitter.com/OBSEleicoes/status/1127963350367985666?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7...

...and here, he's repeating the same soundbite 4 times in a row. Even António Costa is seen a bit uncomfortable.
https://twitter.com/AntNLeite62/status/1127315217766076416

[DavidB.]

Ipsos poll, Netherlands, compared to last poll 2 weeks ago:

VVD 5
Forum voor Democratie 5
CDA 3
GroenLinks 3
D66 3 (+1)
PvdA 3 (+1)
PVV 2
CU-SGP 1 (-1)
SP 1
PvdD 0 (-1)
50Plus 0
DENK 0
Volt 0

Rutte is clearly getting nervous (says not just me, but journalists from newspapers such as NRC) and has challenged Baudet for a one-on-one debate. Smart move, because Rutte can continue hammering on the Nexit nail that is a liability to Baudet as it is unpopular - and he can thereby gain both VVD-FVD swing voters and stability-oriented centrist and center-right voters. But Rutte's popularity has waned too. In a speech he sought to portray Baudet as a theoretical academic out of touch with reality. Baudet appeared to accept this invitation and responded by sending Rutte autographed copies of all of his books on the nation-state and the EU, his PhD dissertation among them. The VVD syphoning off center-right voters who aren't necessarily happy with the government's course but are also afraid of Nexit could hurt FVD as well as the CDA, but on the other hand FVD could gain even more voters from the PVV.

I also think Volt has gained enough attention and traction to make it to at least 1%, which is still far off from the (natural) threshold of 3.7%, but may affect D66's chances to win a third seat.

CU continue to insist not to sit with Forum after the election, which presumably means they join the EPP. More interestingly, the SGP claim to join CU in any case, even though many SGP voters may sympathize more with Forum than with CU (especially on issues related to the EU) and CU-SGP already have quite a "CU heavy" manifesto (but sources in the SGP tell me they may still stay in ECR if CU leave and this is just to keep the relationship with CU okay before the election). None of this would matter if this poll is correct and CU-SGP lose their second seat (which belongs to the SGP), but I don't think this will actually happen: turnout will be low, CU are doing relatively well in the polls and CU-SGP voters turn out at a high rate. But we will see.

[Former President tack50]

Worth noting that there would be nothing stopping CU and SGP from sitting in different groups from the EU's side. We have already had a handful of examples here.

In 2014 the Coalition for Europe (CiU+PNV) elected 3 MEPs, 2 from CiU and 1 from PNV. The PNV MEP and one of the CiU ones joined ALDE while the remaining CiU MEP joined EPP.

This year, ERC (G/EFA) and Bildu (GUE/NGL) are running in a joint list as well

[DavidB.]

https://twitter.com/thierrybaudet/status/1128555224904417280
Response:
https://twitter.com/VVD/status/1128571366217797632

Worth noting that there would be nothing stopping CU and SGP from sitting in different groups from the EU's side

Oh, of course, and they've done it before: from 2009 until 2014, when CU were in ECR but SGP weren't welcome because they didn't allow women on their lists. The court forced them to drop that official position, but now they simply don't tend to have women on their list anyway (but it's enough for the Dutch court and for ECR).

[DavidB.]

Baudet hands over his books to Rutte who tries to keep his composure but seems pretty sour, and he sets the terms for the debate that Rutte wanted: the evening before the election (Wednesday May 22) at 10 PM, no Dutch Public Broadcaster or interference of other tv studios, everything livestreamed on Facebook, moderator to be discussed, with the option of inviting over both EP leaders (Derk Jan Eppink for FVD, Malik Azmani for VVD) to take part in the debate too, in the presence of 150 FVD supporters and 150 VVD supporters.

See the below video:

https://twitter.com/thierrybaudet/status/1128700770432552960

[Mike88]

Portugal' official election web page for the EP election is already online:

https://www.europeias2019.mai.gov.pt/

The page has all 21+substitutes candidates for all 17 parties running in the elections. Plus, it will show turnout rates and live results on election day.

It has also a sample ballot that will be given to voters on election day:


Image from SIC Notícias.

[YL]

LucidTalk poll of Northern Ireland.

Recall NI has three seats, currently one each for Sinn Féin, the DUP and UUP, and uses STV.

Anderson (SF) 27.2%
Dodds (DUP) 20.2%
Eastwood (SDLP) 13.1%
Kennedy (UUP) 11.8%
Long (Alliance) 11.3%
Allister (TUV) 8.5%
Bailey (Green) 4.6%
Hill (UKIP) 1.7%
Morrice (Ind) 1.4%
Bhogal (Con) 0.1%
McCann (Ind) 0.1%

On these figures, the UUP are in trouble.  The transfers of the SF surplus and the bottom five candidates' votes are going to help the SDLP and Alliance over them.  Some of Allister's transfers will find their way to the UUP but it's not impossible they'll be fifth at that point and eliminated.  Even if they're not fifth, then it's not looking good for them: if it's the SDLP eliminated their transfers will favour Alliance, while Alliance transfers tended to favour the SDLP quite strongly in the local government elections, so whichever of those two is left would be likely to take the seat.  (If the UUP are eliminated, then their transfers, whether directly or via a DUP surplus, should favour Alliance enough that the seat is likely to go to them in that scenario.)

[Former President tack50]

Apparently this is an ad from the Bulgarian government to try and get young people to vote lol

[Mike88]

Patriarchate of Lisbon enters in the EP election campaign by sharing on social media a publication that calls for voting in CDS, Basta! and NC:


The table shared by the Church. Picture from Observador newspaper.

The Patriarchate of Lisbon, the highest ranking Catholic Church institution in Portugal, entered in the EP election campaign, today, by sharing a table on the parties positions on abortion, euthanasia, prostitution, etc. By the info in the table, the Church advised the vote in CDS, Basta! or NC, while they refuse any support to PS, CDU and PAN. The post created huge backlash on social media, and two hours later, the Patriarchate deleted the post, saying it was a mistake.

Party leaders and candidates accept the excuse of the Patriarchate, and the majority are downplaying the issue, while Basta! candidate André Ventura said it was "was God who put me in this fight", and CDS says they cannot respond by the actions of the Patriarchate.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

Patriarchate of Lisbon enters in the EP election campaign by sharing on social media a publication that calls for voting in CDS, Basta! and NC:


The table shared by the Church. Picture from Observador newspaper.

The Patriarchate of Lisbon, the highest ranking Catholic Church institution in Portugal, entered in the EP election campaign, today, by sharing a table on the parties positions on abortion, euthanasia, prostitution, etc. By the info in the table, the Church advised the vote in CDS, Basta! or NC, while they refuse any support to PS, CDU and PAN. The post created huge backlash on social media, and two hours later, the Patriarchate deleted the post, saying it was a mistake.

Party leaders and candidates accept the excuse of the Patriarchate, and the majority are downplaying the issue, while Basta! candidate André Ventura said it was "was God who put me in this fight", and CDS says they cannot respond by the actions of the Patriarchate.

The Church seems surprisngly open to the CDU. I'm guessing irt prostitution they're aligned on the Swedish/EndDemand model, but why are they so ambivalent on other issues?

[bigic]

Lol they used the German CDU logo
The Portuguese commies don't seem to be very socially progressive?

[Beezer]

[DavidB.]

I&O poll, the Netherlands (compared to 2 weeks ago):

VVD 4 (-1)
Forum voor Democratie 4
GroenLinks 3 (-1)
PvdA 3
CDA 3 (+1)
D66 2 (-1)
CU-SGP 2
PVV 2 (+1)
SP 1 (-1)
PvdD 1 (+1)
50Plus 1 (+1)
DENK 0
Volt 0

Issues that most determine people's vote are "values and norms" (i.e. the perception that decent behavior has become too rare in society; 46%), immigration (43%) and the environment/climate (42%).

[Anzeigenhauptmeister]

The Dutch SP have come up with an ad that unusually harshly criticizes Frans Timmermans. It is really one big personal attack on Timmermans, portrayed as "Hans Brusselmans" who is some sort of elitist cartoon villain who hates ordinary people, throws referendum results in a fire and exhibits six out of the seven cardinal sins in pretty gross ways. The SP received a massive load of criticism for it, to which party chairman Ron Meyer responded that someone who attempts to become the next leader of the European Commission should be able to withstand a parody.

However, apart from bashing Timmermans the video doesn't offer a clear alternative vision on behalf of the SP (except for "no superstate"). I can imagine the video helping both the PvdA and the SP. I can also imagine it only helping the PvdA, as GL and D66 voters are drawn towards Timmermans in the first place.

Otherwise not much of a campaign going on yet. Here's the FVD ad: "Europe at a crossroads."

Timmermans postulated in yesterday's TV debate in Germany that Islam has belonged to Europe for over 2,000 years. Even though it has only existed since the 7th century... 

https://twitter.com/Hadmut/status/1129174046623567872

[Former President tack50]

Unlike other times, I have been unable to find actual campaign posters for the EU elections (which are barely given attention compared to the local/regional elections). So instead here are some TV/Youtube ads. Again, many look like they are not intended for TV or are proper ads, but closest thing I was able to find. Also I won't be able to find from all parties, but here it goes:

PSOE: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_q7G9eLJ6M
PP*: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=31d3zsZ9TsM
Cs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KOB9PavW3oc
UP: https://youtu.be/Y6z9Bz2qDj8
Vox: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDGuEFHKhkg
PACMA: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xQi9SpmdmIk

ERC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yaK0aXjxpyU
JxCat: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSSxsVf-4OU
PNV: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=011qWTCJHik
EH Bildu²: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ia0dULdudmw
Compromís³: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ql4Moxdos3k

Only party with representation in the national Congress that isn't running an ad is CC. PRC as well, but they aren't running or supporting any coalition in the EU elections. Also I am doubtful about that PP ad, it definitely doesn't look like a TV ad unlike the others

*; maybe not a proper ad
2: Generic ad about the "Ahora Repúblicas" coalition
3: Generic ad about the "Compromiso por Europa" coalition

Regarding these ads, the most surprising thing is probably seeing ERC running ads in Spanish at all! (though I imagine the main one is the one in Catalan).