{"id":637341,"date":"2025-12-17T03:59:16","date_gmt":"2025-12-17T03:59:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/637341\/"},"modified":"2025-12-17T03:59:16","modified_gmt":"2025-12-17T03:59:16","slug":"merz-and-weber-deliver-triumphant-week-for-europes-center-right-politico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/637341\/","title":{"rendered":"Merz and Weber deliver triumphant week for Europe\u2019s center right \u2013 POLITICO"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\u201cIt is good that the Commission is now opening up regulation in the automotive sector following the clear signal from the federal government,\u201d Merz told BILD, a sister publication of POLITICO in the Axel Springer Group, on Tuesday. Weber, too, celebrated the result to BILD, heralding it as the product of late-night talks with Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who also hails from the EPP.<\/p>\n<p>The partnership between the two German heavyweights was cemented at January\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.eu\/newsletter\/brussels-playbook\/epps-berlin-love-in\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">EPP leaders\u2019 summit<\/a> in Berlin. There, Merz flaunted his ties to Europe\u2019s center-right elite \u2014 including von der Leyen \u2014\u00a0to impress domestic voters, while Weber flexed his party muscle by delivering a parade of prime ministers to Merz\u2019s doorstep, bolstering his own grip on the EPP.<\/p>\n<p>Weber said the EPP\u2019s achievements under his leadership address the issues that drive Europe\u2019s voters toward the far right. \u201cMy plan and my ambitions as EPP leader were clear: I want to stop populism in Europe \u2026 I want to take away the reasons of attack, the points of attack from the populists against Europe,\u201d he told a press conference on Tuesday.<\/p>\n<p>The biggest victory for Merz and Weber has been to secure a Commission proposal reversing the EU\u2019s de facto combustion engine ban by lowering the emission reduction target for car producers from 100 percent to 90 percent.<\/p>\n<p>Both publicly celebrated the move last week before it was officially announced, irking the liberals and the center-left, who saw it as von der Leyen giving her own party concessions behind closed doors.<\/p>\n<p>Weber going to the press and calling victory \u201ceven before it is decided in the Commission\u2019s college \u2026 is unacceptable,\u201d said Renew Europe chief Val\u00e9rie Hayer. \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cIt is good that the Commission is now opening up regulation in the automotive sector following the clear&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":637342,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5174],"tags":[32,2000,299,5187,1945,1824,30995,196484,770,49,1220,41048],"class_list":{"0":"post-637341","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-eu","8":"tag-donald-trump","9":"tag-eu","10":"tag-europe","11":"tag-european","12":"tag-friedrich-merz","13":"tag-germany","14":"tag-manfred-weber","15":"tag-patryk-jaki","16":"tag-poland","17":"tag-united-states","18":"tag-ursula-von-der-leyen","19":"tag-valerie-hayer"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115732910737189525","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/637341","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=637341"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/637341\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/637342"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=637341"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=637341"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=637341"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}