This Wednesday, November 27, in Strasbourg, the European Parliament approved the new team of the European Commission, which will take office at the beginning of December. Pact for a clean industry, white paper on defense: President Ursula von der Leyen promised to open a series of projects from the start of her second term, an agenda impacted by the election of Donald Trump in the United States. Here are the main files from the first hundred days.
The Trump Countdown
The new team chaired by Ursula von der Leyen will officially take office at the beginning of December, 50 days before the inauguration of Donald Trump. The first challenge for the European executive will be to face this new situation on a geopolitical level. European leaders must in particular prepare, financially and militarily, for a possible disengagement of the United States in Ukraine.
On the trade side, they must also find a solution if the unpredictable American president significantly increases customs duties on European products as he promised.
Priority to the economy
In the wake of Mario Draghi’s report, Ursula von der Leyen wants to place her second mandate under the sign of economic competitiveness. The German promised to put on the table a “pact for a clean industry” to be put to music by two of her six vice-presidents; the Spaniard Teresa Ribera (Ecological Transition and Competition) and the Frenchman Stéphane Séjourné (Industrial Strategy). The Commission wants to help companies decarbonize their activity.
From his first months, Von der Leyen also promised an “initiative” on artificial intelligence factories, to stimulate new industrial uses of AI.
The explosive Mercosur file
The new Commission starts with a burning issue on the table, the free trade agreement with the Latin American Mercosur countries (Brazil, Paraguay, Argentina, Uruguay), which arouses the anger of farmers, particularly in France. The European executive still intends to sign the agreement, if possible at the beginning of December during a Mercosur summit in Uruguay, but the French government is opposed to it and hopes to find, besides Poland, other allies in within the 27.
Beyond this issue, Ursula von der Leyen promised a “vision on agriculture and food” during her first three months. The new European Commissioner, Luxembourger Christophe Hansen, will notably have to negotiate the next common agricultural policy 2028-2034. A recent report recommended “much more targeted” aid to those who need it, and the calculation of which would no longer be based on the size of farms.
White Paper on Defense
The Commission intends to present in its first hundred days “a white paper on the future of European defense”, which would identify in particular the “investment needs” of the EU, a crucial subject since the war in Ukraine. For the first time, the European executive has appointed a commissioner in charge of these issues, the Lithuanian Andrius Kubilius.
In June, Von der Leyen estimated the financing needs over ten years at around 500 billion euros. But the obstacles remain numerous in the face of the reluctance of several member states, at a time when the EU must also finance, among other things, its energy transition.
The President of the Commission also announced an action plan on hospital cybersecurity during her first three months in office.
Immigration
In a Europe faced with the rise of the far right, immigration is already at the top of the European agenda. During a summit in Brussels on October 17, the 27 called “urgently” for a law to speed up the expulsions of foreigners in an irregular situation.
Ursula von der Leyen had taken the lead a few days earlier by promising to “quickly” put a new proposal on the table. A new text is therefore in the pipeline, while the EU had already adopted the pact on migration and asylum in mid-May 2024, which should come into force in mid-2026 with a tightening of “filtering” at the borders and a solidarity mechanism between member states.