Le Pen's National Front joins new right-wing faction

The French National Rally party is also joining the new far-right Patriots for Europe faction in the European Parliament. This was announced by Hungarian government spokeswoman Eszter Vitalius today in Budapest during the weekly government press conference, confirming corresponding media reports. This means that the former right-wing faction “Identity and Democracy” (ID) has been almost completely absorbed into the new group.

In the morning, Italy's Deputy Prime Minister and Transport Minister Matteo Salvini announced that his ruling right-wing Lega party would join the new European Parliamentary Group. “After a long work, a great group of patriots was born today in Brussels, which will be decisive for transforming the future of this Europe,” Salvini said on social media today.

The League is represented in the European Union Identity group alongside Marine Le Pen’s National Front and Austria’s Freedom Party. Spain’s conservative Vox party also announced on Friday that it would leave Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s European Conservatives and Reformists group and join the Patriots for Europe group.

Wilders' party is also on board.

The Nationalists faction, newly formed by Austria’s Freedom Party, Viktor Orbán’s Fidesz party in Hungary and the Czech Republic’s populist ANO party, has found increasing support in recent days. With the latest announcements, the group has secured the 23 mandates from seven EU countries needed to establish a parliamentary group.

Geert Wilders’s Dutch Freedom Party, the Danish People’s Party, the Portuguese Chega and the Belgian Vlaams Belang also want to join the new faction. As with the Identity and Democracy parliamentary group, the Front National is likely to have the largest number of MPs among the Patriots for Europe. There were disagreements within the Identity Party ahead of the EU elections after the exclusion of the Alternative for Germany at the instigation of the Front National.