Timmermans & Wilders pleased with EU election results; NSC lost voters over PVV deal

Frans Timmermans, the leader of left wing political party GroenLinks-PvdA, said he was happy with the eight seats that his merged party appears to have won in the European Parliament elections. Geert Wilders said he was "extremely happy" with the outcome, with Ipsos I&O/NOS exit polling showing his far-right PVV earned seven seats. Meanwhile, the NSC was left wondering why its support has been decimated since the Dutch General Election in November, with party leader Peter Omtzigt wondering if his coalition with the PVV is the reason.

The GroenLinks-PvdA party was projected to be the largest Dutch party in Brussels, even though it will likely lose one of its nine seats. Yet Timmermans, the green social democrat, was deliriously happy on Thursday evening. “We can get started with this.” He hopes to bring solidarity to a safer Europe, and wants to "ensure that there is a Green Deal 2.0."

Although he also congratulated the PVV, Timmermans is also very happy with other pro-European parties that scored well according to the exit poll. He also said he appreciated those voters who went to the polls in the Netherlands, even though fewer than half of eligible voters showed up. Still, the projected 47 percent turnout was the highest in an EU election in the Netherlands since 1989.

"Highest turnout since the fall of the wall. Great result. Europe is alive," Timmermans shouted to his party members gathered in TivoliVredenburg in Utrecht. "If you add up all the seats of the pro-European parties, we say to the rest of Europe that has yet to vote, "It is not at all a foregone conclusion that the radical right will win these elections," Timmermans said.

"Look what the Netherlands is doing, do the same." His words received deafening applause from the packed hall, which had previously responded frantically to the outcome of the exit poll.

"In Europe, the story so far is that the radical right and extreme right are on the rise. The Netherlands shows that progressive Europe can have an answer and that we stand for solidarity, a social, green and strong Europe," said the party's European faction leader, Bas Eickhout. "We showed today: we can do it. We stand for the alternative that the Netherlands is longing for."

PVV leader Geert Wilders was "extremely happy" that his party was just one seat shy of GroenLinks-PvdA. But Wilders hopes that his party will still come out on top when the votes are counted and the preliminary official results are released on Sunday. He called it "a gigantic victory".

The results will be released on Sunday evening based on the votes counted in municipalities. For now, Wilders called the seven-seat victory "unprecedented." He said, "I don't think parties have achieved this much before," referring to the increase from just one seat. In fact, the party lost four of its seats in the 2019 election, but gained back one after the distribution of British seats as a result of Brexit. That MEP then jumped over to Forum voor Democratie.

Still, the fact that GroenLinks-PvdA was projected higher showed that the PVV may no longer be the most popular party in the Netherlands, a title earned after the November Dutch Parliament election. "A better result is of course always possible, but I actually did not expect it," Wilders said.

The fact that NSC will collaborate with the PVV in a new Cabinet "may also be a reason" why far fewer people voted for NSC in the European elections than in the Parliamentary elections in November, said NSC leader Pieter Omtzigt after the exit polling data was published. His party secured one of the 31 seats allocated to the Netherlands.

Mathematically, it means NSC has now lost two-thirds of its voters. "We are going to speak to the voters," Omtzigt said about his party's results. His party has agreed to form a coalition government with the PVV, VVD and BBB.

Further, the obscurity of NSC's European party leader, Dirk Gotink, may have played a role in the disappointing results. "When I participated in November, we were new as a party, but as a Member of Parliament I was not new at all." Before Omtzigt founded NSC at the end of last summer, he was briefly an independent Member of Parliament after breaking with the CDA where he had been one of the party's MPs for many years.

"We have not yet been able to show what we can do in Brussels. So it is very normal that you do not get a very big score the first time." Omtzigt is especially proud of what his new party has achieved in a short time. In the parliamentary elections, NSC became the third largest party with 20 seats in the lower house of Parliament putting them in a position to join the next Cabinet.

Still, Gotink tried to put a positive spin on the night. With one of 720 European Parliament seats, his party has "a good foot in the door," he said. He was a former policy advisor and spokesperson for Manfred Weber, the leader of the European People's Party (EPP).

In Europe, NSC wants to join the Christian Democratic EPP faction. That is now by far the largest group in the European Parliament. The CDA is part of that. BBB also wants to join in.

BBB leader Caroline van der Plas said she was delighted that her party appeared to have won two seats in the new European Parliament. She said this result is partly due to BBB's participation in the new governing coalition and to its "climate realism."

The exit poll was more favorable for the party than recent public opinion polls. BBB is participating in the European elections for the first time and the results "were emotional. One seat, we had confidence in that." However the second seat came from "out of nowhere!" She said the election night party was "a madhouse."

After the announcement of the first exit poll, there were loud cheers. Many BBB members told an ANP reporter on site that they expected to win a seat. Two seats is a big win for them. Later in the evening, the crowd chanted, "Two, two, three!" Many attendees were optimistic about winning an additional seat in the final results, which will be announced on Sunday evening.

The two MEPs that BBB seems to be able to delegate are "hugely important", Van der Plas thinks. "Because in Brussels, everything is decided there." BBB intends to make important adjustments to European climate and agricultural policy.

European Party leader Sander Smit will "bring a course correction" in Brussels, he said. He was not impressed by the results from GroenLinks-PvdA, which seems to be the largest. “If you put all the right-wing parties together, they are the largest.” According to the current exit poll, Smit will enter the European Parliament together with party number two, Jessika van Leeuwen.

"Of course, we had hoped for more, but we can be quite happy with the result," said the VVD's European party leader, Malik Azmani, after a disappointing exit poll for the party. The right wing faction was projected to drop from five to four seats. During the results evening in Rotterdam's Hotel nhow, Azmani told the members present that they can be "quite proud," because the VVD appears to be becoming the third largest Dutch party in the European Parliament.

The party leader responded negatively to the question whether voters punished the VVD because the party will collaborate in the Netherlands with the far right PVV, he told NOS.

In its European political group, Renew, the VVD faced enormous criticism for its cooperation with Geert Wilders' party. Group leader Valérie Hayer recently spoke out about this in sharp terms, and even threatened to expel the VVD from Renew. These comments have cost the VVD seats, speculated current MEP Bart Groothuis, who held the second spot on the VVD's list.

"Her comments did not do the VVD any good," said Groothuis. "Those comments were fully disproportionate, she should not have done that," he said. "She has gone beyond her limits. We are going to have a serious discussion about that." According to Groothuis, there was no chance of the VVD leaving Renew.

VVD Infrastructure Minister Mark Harbers said it was "a realistic result" and "a reflection of national politics." Harbers stated, "Four seats is a good basis, so you can really do work in the European Parliament. With fewer seats this becomes more difficult."

Party leader Dilan Yeşilgöz did not give a speech after the election, her party's second poor result with her at the helm. She left the party meeting early because the party thought it would be more appropriate for Azmani to give a speech during the European elections, her spokesperson said.

"Thank you for your vote! We have a very nice evening in Rotterdam and we will work hard for you again tomorrow morning! Everywhere in the Netherlands and in Europe!" she wrote on X.