European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen came out swinging against a motion of censure from the far right of the European Parliament on Monday, though the dressing down she took from her would-be political partners is probably a bigger concern.

"It is taken right from the oldest playbook of extremists, polarizing society, eroding trust in democracy," the German center-right EU official told the floor, accusing the initiator, far-right parliamentarian Gheorghe Piperea, of making a huge distortion. The motion garnered some 75 signatures from within the 720-seat house, meeting the low threshold to be considered. Piperea has been a member of the EU parliament since July 2024, representing Romania's Alianta pentru Unirea Romanilor (AUR), part of the European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR) group.

"We can follow Mr Piperea down his world of conspiracies and alleged sinister plots… or we can clearly call this out for what it is: another crude attempt to drive a wedge between our institutions," she said.

Theoretically, the proposal, which hits out at, among other things, the long-standing transparency concerns over the negotiation of colossal EU contracts for Covid-19 vaccines, could see the bloc's most powerful official ejected from office at a crunch vote on Thursday, July 10. If the motion succeeds, Von der Leyen and the 26 other members of the European Commission would have to resign.

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