The far right: Meloni leads the way to an EU takeover

By David Broder

NEW YORK: There is just one question on voting day. Do you want an Islamized Europe or a European Europe? This stark choice was posed by Marion Marechal, a rising star of the French far right, at the launch of her party's campaign for the European elections in June. In an incendiary speech, she spoke of a Europe under siege from many foreign powers and Islamist organizations profiting from anarchic immigration in their efforts at destabilization, subverting our youth, organizing something like a Fifth Column in our countries and recruiting deadly jihadist soldiers. She was joined by a stream of speakers bewailing a European project hijacked by L.G.B.T.Q. activists, environmental fanatics and anti-Western ideologues.

Yet for all the apocalyptic anger, this wasn't a call to quit the European Union. While Marechal's Reconquest party sulfurously accuses elites of orchestrating a Great Replacement of Christians by Muslims, it seeks its own place in the corridors of power. Across the continent, the aim of far-right parties like hers is not to exit the bloc but, increasingly, to take it over. In this project, they have a model: Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni of Italy.

Meloni is already an inspiration to the European far right. As the head of the right-wing coalition in Italy, she has overseen attacks on L.G.B.T.Q. groups and migrant-rescue organizations, a takeover of the public broadcaster and a continuing attempt to change the Constitution to expand executive power. But its on the continent where she has really distinguished herself. Combining staunch Atlanticism commitment to NATO and Ukrainian defense alike with relentless opposition to immigration and climate policy, she has become a major force in Europe. For the European far right, poised for an advance, Meloni is leading the way.

Since coming to power in October 2022, Meloni has impressed many with her pragmatic approach and abandonment of her previous criticism of the European Union. In Brussels, she has developed a reputation for skillful diplomacy. She was christened an Orban whisperer, for example, after helping talk Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary out of vetoing further E.U. aid to Ukraine this year. His change of mind didn't come without a cost the European Commission also released 10.2 billion euros, or $10.8 billion, of previously withheld funds for his government but Meloni was still crucial to winning him around.

Such diplomatic success has led some to suggest that Meloni is not falling in line but actually setting the agenda. In a report widely seen in Italy, Fareed Zakaria on CNN hailed Meloni's moment in Europe, comparing her position with the leading role previously played by Angela Merkel, Germany's former chancellor. On economic policy, the claim is overblown; Italy's economy, though growing, isn't staking out new territory. But the comparison is not without merit. In several areas, Rome is giving Brussels direction.

For one, Meloni has been at the forefront of plans to further outsource the blocs border policing to autocratic North African countries. In July last year, she was in Tunisia to announce a deal to curb migration across the Mediterranean; last month, she did the same in Egypt. Both times she was flanked by Europe's top official and president of the commission, Ursula von der Leyen, who in January gave her blessing to Meloni's broader vision for E.U.-Africa relations. Even as the bloc agrees on new rules for processing migrants once they reach the continent, Italy is working to ensure they don't arrive in the first place.

Meloni has also been a thorn in the side of the bloc's green transition. Deriding the European Green Deal, a suite of environmental legislation, as climate fundamentalism, she has consistently attempted to slow or stop green policies. Often, Italy has been alone or little supported in these efforts. But in February, Meloni was central to a vote opposing the bloc's centerpiece nature restoration law, which seeks to repair damaged ecosystems across the continent.

Tellingly, Meloni was joined in that vote by the center-right European People's Party, which is the largest group of parties in Brussels and includes the German Christian Democrats. The group, which had already sought to scale back the bloc's climate commitments, called the proposal an attack on farmers, who have recently held protests across Europe. Helped by some dissident center-right parliamentarians voting in favor, the legislation passed. But center-right leaders hopes to derail a ban on new combustion-engine cars point to further collaboration to come.

Polls ahead of June's elections suggest that center-to-far-right forces are on course to win around 50 percent of seats in Parliament. For many on the hard right, this offers a chance to end the grand coalition of Socialists and Christian Democrats that has historically dominated European politics and instead create a right-wing alliance that would hold the top jobs. In practice, such cooperation is difficult: Center-right leaders say that they will ally only with pro-E.U., pro-NATO, pro-Ukraine and pro-rule-of-law parties. That rules out a decent portion of Europe's far-right parties, at least for now. It does, however, allow for a full embrace of Meloni.

More radical forces, following Meloni's example, are recalibrating. In Marine Le Pen's National Rally in France, top figures are walking back their previous NATO-critical stances and distancing themselves from the more intransigent Alternative for Germany. Mr. Orban, long a black sheep in European affairs, is also looking to break out of isolation before Hungary takes over the blocs presidency in July. He claims he will join the European Conservatives and Reformists, the group led by Meloni, after June's election a reportedly welcome prospect for the group, even if Mr. Orban's softness on Russia could be a stumbling block.