EU Analytics – December 2025 review: The change of guards at the European Parliament is picking up speed

By Nicolai von Ondarza

Which party groups were part of the majority in December 2025? (Source: Own calculation based on data from HowTheyVote.EU. Click to enlarge.)

The year 2026 is starting with a geopolitical bang, and many uncomfortable questions for Europe and its place in the world. But EU Analytics focuses on decision-making and voting in the EU, so I still want to take the time to look back into the voting in the European Parliament and the Council of the EU in December 2025. And though it got less attention in a news environment dominated by war and (no real progress on) peace, there are still important stories to tell.

The most important one is a continuation of the change of guards, with the centre-right to far-right majority gaining even more influence, to the detriment of centre-left and progressive parties. In the Council, the few public votes showed that two big countries can be outvoted together (this time Germany and Italy), while Hungary voted against or abstained on the major EU defence initiatives. We also saw a further surprise use of Art. 122 TFEU for the Russian assets, which showed the EU’s capacity to act, but also raises further questions on democratic legitimacy, bypassing the European Parliament. Time to dive in:

Highlight of the month: European Citizens’ Initiative “My voice, my choice: for safe and accessible abortion”

Although the far-right gained even more influence in the EP this month (see below), I chose a counter example to highlight how complex building majorities in the Parliament currently is, and that different majorities are still possible. The vote in question was an endorsement of an EU Citizens’ Initiative called “My voice, my choice”, which campaigned for safe and accessible abortion across Europe. The ECI gained the necessary over 1 million signatures across the EU in September 2025, and was endorsed by the Parliament in December.

Though the endorsement is more symbolic – the Commission will have to put forward its response which could but does not have to include a legislative initiative by March 2026 – abortion is always a highly political issue that often goes right through the left-right divide. It was therefore noteworthy that this vote was carried by an unusual centre-left to left majority: The S&D, Greens, Renew and the Left all voted in favour, whereas the EPP was split in the middle and the far-right groups mostly voted against. From the EPP, particularly noteworthy were the Polish members who all voted in favour, presumably because abortion is such a divisive and differentiating issue in contrast to the PiS (ECR) in Poland.

Source: Own calculation based on voting data from HowTheyVote.eu.

This vote therefore shows that in cases where the EPP is divided, centre-left to left majorities are still possible in the current European Parliament. But only if the EPP is divided, hence its key role as decision-maker.

Final votes in the European Parliament

In December 2025, the EP had one major plenary session, from 16 to 18 December. In terms of the votes, the plenary had 31 votes recorded at HowTheyVote.EU. From these, in contrast to the example above, the most important story to tell for me is the slow, but sure shift in political gravity towards the right and partially far-right. Three data points highlight this in particular.

First, the so called “Venezuela majority” – the centre-right to far-right majority that was first used on a resolution regarding Venezuela in September 2024 – has changed from an exception to a normal option. From the 31 votes, four were carried by this majority, where the EPP only had a majority with the far-right. This might not seem like much, but these four votes concerned another delay to the implementation of the deforestation law, votes on the simplification agenda and a vote on the establishment of safe countries of origin at Union level. These were thus four crucial votes, with hard legislative effect, and in core areas of the EU’s agenda. In contrast, the “von der Leyen” majority of the centre-right and the centre-left still wins a majority of votes, but currently the less politically important ones.

Far-right groups are more and more often part of the majority

The second is a continuation of a trend I observed last months: the far-right groups are more and more often part of the winning majorities, whereas the centre-left and the left are losing ground. Most notably, in December 2025 the self-styled Patriots for Europe were more often part of the majority in the European Parliament than the Greens. The ECR was as often part of the majority as the S&D. Looking at the second half of 2025, in which I collected this data, the trend was first slow, then sudden: The far-right parties are de facto part of the majority of winning votes in the European Parliament.

Source: Own calculation based on voting data from HowTheyVote.eu.

A final point of note in the EP is that this month saw a further continuation of the ESN becoming more mainstream. As the most extreme of the far-right groups, it used to play a role of fundamental opposition. In October 2025, it only was part of the majority in 23.7% of the votes. Fast forward to December 2025, and for the first time in my data set the ESN voted an astonishing 61.3 per cent of the time with the majority of the European Parliament. This is only 10 percentage points (so three votes) below the Greens, and above the Left. It does not necessarily mean, however, that the ESN has become more moderate, but rather that the whole centre of gravity in the EP has moved to the right.

Public votes in the Council of the EU

For monitoring the Council votes, the analysis builds upon the public votes published, which are always fewer. For December 2025, there were only 9 votes published under qualified majority. Looking through the data, a few things stand out:

• The most consequential QMV vote was probably the one that did not take place at all – on the Mercosur trade deal, where the vote was postponed after Italy’s Giorgia Meloni joined France in the call for a delay. The importance of the trade agreement with South America has grown further since, and it now looks likely that Italy will back the agreement in early January.
• The other Council votes were characterised by more disagreement, as only 5 of the 9 votes (56%) passed with unanimity, another vote with only abstentions.
• The no votes came from Hungary and Spain. The latter is becoming politically more isolated in the EU with the rise of the centre to far right across the continent, and I would expect more no votes coming from Spain in 2026.
• Curiously, the two votes on which Hungary voted against and abstained were both related to European defence – voting against defence-related investments in the EU budget as part of the ReArm program and abstaining on the European Defence Industry Program (EDIP). This stands in contrast to Hungary being one of the main beneficiaries of the SAFE defence loans.
• A noteworthy case of “The big countries can also be outvoted” was a vote on the regulation on detergents and surfactants, in which Italy and Germany were outvoted together, despite representing around a third of the EU’s population among them:

Public vote on a regulation concerning detergents and surfactants. Source: Council of the EU.

Nicolai von Ondarza is Head of the Research Division EU/Europe of the German Institute of International and Security Affairs (Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik).

EU Analytics is a monthly column by Nicolai von Ondarza. It focuses on data-driven analysis of EU institutional affairs, looking at voting in the European Parliament and the public votes of the Council of the EU. The articles are cross-posted here from Nicolai’s own newsletter on Substack, where he occasionally also does other institutional analysis.

Pictures: Bar chart majorities: Nicolai von Ondarza, with Google Gemini [all rights reserved]; portrait Nicolai von Ondarza: Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik [all rights reserved].