“Public Humiliation”: MEPs Call for Political Consequences After Pfizergate Verdict

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As a reminder, the texts were used to negotiate the procurement of 1.8 billion doses of Pfizer vaccines for around €35 billion, in addition to the purchase of another 2.8 billion doses from other manufacturers. That’s over 10 shots for every single European, worth over €70 billion in total. Barely more than one-fifth of those were ever administered, meaning the vast majority will inevitably end up in landfills.

Yet, despite the fact that it could be key to understanding this unimaginable waste of taxpayer funds, the ECJ ruling holds no immediate consequence with regard to the disclosure of the Pfizer texts. The Commission already stated that it won’t release them. Von der Leyen has two months to appeal the decision, and the process for a final ruling typically takes another 15 to 24 months. In other words, the public is not likely to see any of the texts for at least another one or two years—if ever.

Similarly, as even mainstream media were quick to point out, this “serious scratch” on von der Leyen’s image will have “no real-world political fallout” either, simply because there’s no mechanism to hold von der Leyen accountable, nor is there any real desire among the establishment parties of the Parliament’s ‘Ursula coalition’ to do so.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that those outside her political camp will stop fighting for transparency and accountability, and to finally put an end to the endless abuse of power at the heart of the EU.

If von der Leyen “has nothing to hide, then she has nothing to be afraid of,” Danish MEP Anders Vistisen, chief whip of the Patriots for Europe (PfE) group, told europeanconservative.com. “But, it is clear by her refusal to make public her text messages exchanged with the Pfizer CEO that she indeed has a reason to conceal her actions.”

Vistisen noted that von der Leyen has a history of deleting phone messages to hide evidence of large-scale corruption, as something very similar happened when she was facing serious allegations involving public procurement fraud while serving as German defense minister. She escaped accountability in that case by being appointed as the EU Commission president for the first time in 2019.

According to Vistisen, the “public humiliation” of the ECJ ruling should be followed by immediate political consequences, and it’s up to each group in the European Parliament to pick a side.

“If she is unwilling to fully disclose these text messages, she must be pushed out by the European Parliament. That would put the whole Commission on the line,” he said. “Let’s see how the different political groups divide on this issue.”

Others, like Dutch MEP Marieke Ehlers (PfE) and former French MEP Patricia Chagnon (RN), conveyed similar views, saying Europeans deserve to know the truth, and that letting von der Leyen off without any consequence would be a violation of basic democratic principles.

“The only guarantee of democracy is transparency. When you start hiding stuff, that’s no longer a democracy,” Chagnon told europeanconservative.com. “Politicians get their mandate from their electorate, and therefore must remain accountable to them. I despise any politician who doesn’t want to be accountable for what they’ve done.”

Rob Roos, another former MEP from ECR, wrote about how absurd it is that a separate lawsuit that was lodged against von der Leyen over her refusal to release the texts was declared “inadmissible” by a Belgian court earlier this year due to the plaintiff’s failure to demonstrate “personal harm” or “sufficient interest”—despite over 1,000 co-complainants joining the case, including MEPs, transparency watchdogs, and even member states—while the ECJ ruled in favor of The New York Times.

“This decision raises a fundamental question: why should a foreign newspaper possess stronger transparency rights than a MEP, than European citizens and Member States themselves?” Roos wrote on X.

The same argument was made by German MEP Christine Anderson (ESN), who commented that it’s unacceptable in a democracy that the NYT “has achieved what parliamentarians and citizens have been denied.”

That’s why Anderson, along with Vistisen, Ehlers, and most MEPs on the national conservative side—the PfE, ECR, and ESN groups—once again called for the establishment of an inquiry committee to properly investigate corruption allegations in the EU, such as Pfizergate.

The Patriots finished collecting the required signatures for the proposed Transparency and Accountability Committee (TRAC) earlier this month, and now it’s up to the chairmen of the mainstream parties to allow the initiative to move for a plenary vote. They will probably try to block it, like in other similar cases, and instead offer a working group in the budgetary control committee—knowing full well that it won’t have the power to make any meaningful difference.

“We need a committee of inquiry. Not just any committee, but one with real powers. Powers to summon Ursula von der Leyen, to access Commission documents, and to establish political accountability,” Anderson stated. “Only a real inquiry with subpoena powers can bring truth to light.”