In Charles Dickens’ classic, A Christmas Carol, a visit from the Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come so frightens the miser Ebenezer Scrooge that he changes his ways. So far, visits from the political ghost of Christmas Yet to Come are failing to change the Brussels’ elite’s behaviour, thereby increasing the likelihood that the scenario they most fear will soon become reality.
The populist ghosts regularly arrive these days. They all bear the same message: Change or die. Restore broadly shared economic growth, even if that means slowing or dropping climate targets. Reserve the mass migration from non-Western countries, even if that means mass deportation. Stop the assault on traditional values and above all stop the drive to replace national identity with the contentless clothes of pan-Europeanism or, worse, globalism.
Despite this, parties of the traditional elites continue to persist in hanging together to hang in power. Portugal’s upcoming presidential election is a case in point.
Chega’s Andre Ventura has led the populist party from insignificance to becoming the second largest party in Portugal in just a few years. He easily finished second in January’s first round, winning 23.5 per cent of the vote, a bit more than his party had obtained in the May 2025 parliamentary election.
His opponent in Sunday’s runoff will be the former leader of the Socialist Party, Antonio Jose Seguro. Despite that, most leaders of the ruling centre-right Democratic Alliance and the liberal-right Liberal Initiative are publicly saying they will vote for the Socialist rather than Ventura.
This attempt to form a cordon sanitaire around Ventura and Chega has been repeatedly tried before. It always succeeds in winning in the short run but failing in the long run.
That’s because the deals the centre-right has to make with the centre-left and Left to keep the populist Right out always cause many of its voters disgustedly to leave their ancestral party. Faustian deals always cost one’s soul.
The future Portugal’s Right will ultimately face was on stark display on Sunday February 1 in a French legislative by-election. The candidate backed by Marine Le Pen’s National Rally, Antoine Valentin, crushed the establishment’s choice, Christian Fournier, by over 18 points.
This crushing defeat came in a seat that has always backed candidates of the establishment centre-right party, now known as The Republicans, since 1997. It used to crush National Rally’ predecessor party, the National Front, by roughly 50 points at the turn of the century and had beaten Mr. Valentin by over 12 points in the July national election.
Valentin’s smashing triumph means he gained 30 points compared to his margin of defeat just 17 months ago. That can only have happened if many of the remaining adherents of the old centre-right have finally shifted farther right.
That makes perfect sense given what the Republicans have done since the 2024 election. It consistently backs a Macronist government in budgetary and other votes even when the parliamentary deadlock means it has to cut unsavoury, left-tinged deals with the Socialists.
If voting for the establishment Right empowers the establishment Left, many French conservatives reason, what’s the point of voting for the old Right?
The Republicans’ persistent refusal to look facts in the face continued on Monday in the National Assembly. Despite their massive repudiation by their own voters the day before, only one Republican deputy backed the main motion to censure Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu’s government over its budget.
This decision continues to fly in the face of what the remaining Republican voters want. A poll taken last October found that 41 per cent of Republican voters want the party to form a pact in the next election with National Rally and its allies, the former Republicans led by Éric Ciotti, rather than run alone or aligned with President Macron’s coalition. Yet the Republicans continue to ally with the centre and the Left rather than the populist Right as a plurality their voters prefer.
There is some evidence that a majority of French conservatives would prefer the populist Right to continuing with Macronism. A poll taken last November found that one-third of those who indicate they would vote for Republican Bruno Retailleau in the first round of 2027’s presidential election would back National Rally leader Jordan Bardella in the second round over centre-right Macronist Edouard Philippe. A plurality of Republican voters (41 per cent) would back Bardella over former Macronist Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, and clear majorities would support Bardella over a candidate of the centre-left or far-left.
Scrooge’s volte face gives A Christmas Carol a happy ending. Don’t expect Europe’s ignorant centre-right to avoid Scrooge’s fate if they don’t soon follow his example.
EU has forgotten Pascal’s rule that ‘Law without force is impotent’