At Maastricht debate, Greens remember what it was like to be popular

“It’s because of you that Europe acted on the Green Deal,” said Eickhout, imploring the young audience to vote in June. Then he rounded on von der Leyen, accusing her of dumping her mission halfway through. “We are now at the crossroad of continuing the Green Deal or going back to a fossil standstill.”

For many younger people, climate change still looms large. Eickhout, who repeatedly received the loudest applause, won a poll taken in the room and online for the preferred next Commission boss. The students of the university shaped the debate, which was co-hosted by POLITICO, by choosing climate change as the opening topic. 

Von der Leyen tried to convince the audience, many of whom will be voting for the first time in June’s election, that she is the real thing on climate change. 

“Four years ago, I set the perspective with the climate law and climate neutrality by 2050,” she said. “It has to be implemented, so that it really happens on the ground.” But, like most of the candidates, she gave few concrete details on how she would make that happen, beyond sanctioning a capital markets union to drive private investment into Europe’s green infrastructure.

The occasion was a reminder to Europe’s center right of the cost of compromising on their green ambitions.

Eickhout’s attacks were focused on von der Leyen’s center-right European People’s Party, which has driven a series of green policy walkbacks in recent months. Most notably they rebelled against her landmark legislative proposal to restore 20 percent of the EU’s landmass and waters.