Europe's mainstream pro-European parties are on track to lose their parliamentary majority for the first time since the European Parliament's creation, according to new seat projections that underscore the continent's deepening political fragmentation and the rising strength of hard-right forces.
A projection published yesterday by Europe Elects, an election data platform, shows the three parties that have governed the EU since its modern inception — the centre-right European People's Party, the centrist Renew Europe, and the centre-left Socialists and Democrats — would fall short of a majority if elections were held today. The analysis drew on voting intentions from each EU member state and modelled seat allocations based on each country's electoral law.
The Scale of the Shift
The Socialists and Democrats would suffer the largest loss, shedding 18 MEPs, followed by the European People's Party with 15 and Renew with nine. The Greens/EFA group, which has often propped up the parliamentary majority in the current term, would be further reduced, losing 14 seats. Combined, the pro-European centre would haemorrhage more than 50 seats.
Meanwhile, the hard-right Europe of Sovereign Nations group, which includes Alternative for Germany — currently projected as the leading German party — would gain 19 seats. The far-left group The Left is also projected to gain 19 seats, driven largely by leftist parties in France and Germany. Still, most of the projected gains sit on the right of the chamber. Patriots for Europe, which includes Marine Le Pen's National Rally, is projected to gain 12 seats, driven by Spain's Vox and Austria's Freedom Party. The European Conservatives and Reformists, dominated by Giorgia Meloni's Brothers of Italy, is due to remain largely stable, with three additional MEPs.
The hierarchy of political groups by size would largely hold, with the European People's Party remaining first, followed by the Socialists and Democrats, Patriots for Europe, the European Conservatives and Reformists and Renew. But the gap between the two main centrist forces and the largest right-wing group would narrow sharply. Renew's position would be increasingly challenged by The Left. The Greens/EFA group would slip behind The Left and the far-right Europe of Sovereign Nations, becoming the smallest force in the Parliament — even as its votes become more pivotal than ever, since centrist parties would need the Greens more than at any point to form a majority.
What's Driving the Fragmentation
According to Europe Elects' director Tobias Gerhard Schminke, the latest projections confirm political trends that have defined the EU's electoral landscape in recent years. "The first one that's often overlooked is that we see a fragmentation in the political system. So the EPP has about 21% support now in Europe. So, it will require a lot of political families to come together to form a majority," Schminke told Euronews.
He also pointed to eroding support for the political centre, part of a broader decline in consensus around liberal democracy, human rights and cooperation between European states within the EU framework. Another trend he noted is that within the radical-right camp, forces like Meloni's Brothers of Italy and Le Pen's National Rally have reached a plateau, while most growth is coming from the more extreme forces gathered under the Europe of Sovereign Nations umbrella.
One of the most significant shifts would occur within the European People's Party itself, where Spain's Popular Party and Poland's Civic Platform would become the largest national delegations, ending the German Christian Democratic Union's decade-long dominance of the group. At the same time, the European People's Party would likely strengthen its position further, retaining the ability to form an alternative majority with right-wing parties, already a source of significant leverage for the centre-right group in day-to-day negotiations.
The Cordon Sanitaire Under Pressure
The 2024 European Parliament elections already saw a significant shift in the political barycentre to the right, with right-of-centre parties gaining almost 60 MEPs, much of it driven by far-right, conservative and national-populist forces. If these trends hold through the next elections, due in June 2029, they would further test the EU's unwritten cordon sanitaire: the agreement among mainstream parties to keep extremist forces from power.
"What we still see is an incremental increase of the radical right camp overall. And we're now at the point where it is difficult to ignore these parties when it comes to coalition dynamics, be it in the European Parliament or at the national level," Schminke said.
The next European Parliament elections are not due until June 2029, and three years is a long time in politics. Parliamentary groups can also shift before or after elections, which inevitably affects the distribution of power in the chamber. Still, the projection marks a significant milestone: the centrist forces that have dominated European politics since the Second World War are, for the first time, projected to fall short of a majority at the EU level.
Why This Matters:
The potential collapse of the pro-European centrist majority isn't just a parliamentary arithmetic problem — it's a structural threat to the EU's ability to respond to the crises that define our era. Climate policy, migration reform, industrial strategy, and democratic defence all require coalitions that can hold across multiple legislative cycles. If the centre-left, centre-right, and liberals can't form a majority without either the Greens or hard-right forces, every major decision becomes a negotiation with parties that fundamentally reject the European project's core values. The fragmentation Schminke describes makes governance harder, compromises weaker, and extremist veto power stronger. For those who believe Europe must act collectively on climate, migration, and geopolitical autonomy, the erosion of the pro-European centre is not a distant threat — it's already reshaping what the EU can and cannot do.