After Merkel: Von der Leyen leans on Biden

What happens in the post-Merkel era? EU Commission President von der Leyen has given a first hint: she is leaning on US President Biden – and coordinating her agenda with the White House in Washington.

Shortly before the informal EU summit in Slovenia, von der Leyen picked up the phone and spoke to Biden. If Politico is to be believed, she went over the entire current EU agenda.

China, the UK and the Northern Ireland Agreement, the Western Balkans, the planned global minimum tax and the dispute over data transfers to the USA – Uschi and Joe discussed all of this.

Yet it would be the Council President Michel or the Slovenian Council Presidency who would be responsible for such a vote – if at all.

Until now, it was not customary to telephone the White House before EU summits. Von der Leyen, however, is an incorrigible transatlanticist – even the US alliances in Afghanistan and the Indo-Pacific have not proved her wrong.

She also likes to lean on “strong leaders”. After the end of the Merkel era – and before the presidential election campaign in France – she probably spontaneously thought of Biden…

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version) The original post (in German) is here