EU projection shows far-right parties making big gains in European elections as Greens suffer losses

Far-right parties have made big gains at the European Parliament as the Greens took a major hit at the June 9 European elections, according to a first projection provided by the European Union. With the center losing seats to hard right parties, the EU could find it harder to pass legislation and decision-making could at times be paralyzed in the world’s biggest trading bloc. An unofficial exit poll there suggested that the anti-migrant hard right party of Geert Wilders would make important gains, even though a coalition of pro-European parties has probably pushed it into second place. Casting his vote in the Flanders region, Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo, whose country holds the EU’s rotating presidency until the end of the month, warned that Europe was “more under pressure than ever.” Since the last EU election in 2019, populist or far-right parties now lead governments in three nations — Hungary, Slovakia and Italy — and are part of ruling coalitions in others including Sweden, Finland and, soon, the Netherlands. The biggest political group — the center-right European People’s Party — has moved further right during the present elections on issues like security, climate and migration.