It has a predictable, painfully familiar pattern. The European Commission, led by Commission President Ursula von der Leyen is caught red handed going against their own, self-defined transparency initiative. The European Ombudsman opens an inquiry into the Commission. The Commission publishes a few short, vague and mostly meaningless notes to meet (at least in theory) its own, self-imposed requirements and avoid a more in-depth investigation. The European citizens are left to bear the consequences of whatever backroom deal was achieved and the multinational company involved walks away with millions of euros in its pocket.
End. Repeat. Queen Ursula’s second term has been marred with one scandal after the other, negatively impacting not only her, but causing irreversible harm to the reputation of the Commission in particular, and to the EU in general.
The global champion of transparency can’t even keep its own house in order.
A major transparency controversy surrounding von der Leyen concerns her refusal to disclose text messages exchanged with Pfizer’s CEO Albert Bourla. Immortalized under the moniker Pfizergate, the scandal is the textbook case of everything wrong with the Commission’s functioning and von der Leyen’s leadership style.
The EU’s ombudsman might have criticized the handling of von der Leyen’s Covid-era texts with Bourla (calling it “maladministration”, a ruling of the European Court of Justice was needed to force the Commission’s hand.
And, even after the court has ruled that “the European Commission had failed to show transparency by declining to release” the text messages, also declaring that “the Commission cannot merely state that it does not hold the requested documents”, nothing has really changed.
Scandals on Repeat
The Commission has responded by acknowledging the rulings, promising to “carefully study” it. More detailed explanations were also promised, along with the reconsideration of some decisions. Journalists and experts around the world still wait with their breaths held why the Commission thought that a series of messages that secured a €35 billion deal “were never deemed important enough to be saved” or why they thought that those messages didn’t fall under the “document” category.
Pfizergate was not the first, and obviously not the last on von der Leyen’s long list of scandals, that started as early as her days as German Minister of Defence. (Or even before that: the university panel investigating plagiarism allegations concluded that there were “obvious flaws” in her dissertation.)
In fact, the Pfizergate seems like a “copy-paste” of her conduct as defence minister: her phone was wiped after it was declared evidence during an investigation into alleged wrongdoing in the Bundeswehr’s consultant contracts.
During the investigation, Bundestag MPs have described “annoying stalling tactics”. And von der Leyen has spent millions of euros of the German defence budget on consultancy contracts bypassing public procurement procedures or other regulations.
One such bypass was appointing Katrin Suder (former director of McKinsey, a multinational defence consultancy and a former acquaintance of von der Leyen, who worked with Suder while serving as Germany’s labour minister) as state secretary in 2014, and tasking her with reforming the armaments sector and breaking the prevailing culture of nepotism. Surprisingly, during Suder’s tenure, McKinsey cashed considerable profits from Bundeswehr contracts, turning the army into a “gold mine” for consultancy firms. (€200 million is a very conservative estimate on the total value, as the companies used an elaborate scheme of subcontracts.)
Many of such contracts had been awarded illegally, often ignoring the strict rules of public procurement.
When the pressure grew too high, von der Leyen admitted that she made mistakes during her time as German defence minister, explicitly referring to the lack of supervision over the consultancy contracts and the activity of Suder, but there were no consequences for her. And many of those involved in robbing the Bundeswehr were rewarded with highly lucrative EU jobs once von der Leyen moved her headquarters to Brussels. One of those was Björn Seibert who switched from German ministry official to be the head of von der Leyen’s cabinet – the guy “who makes or break careers in the European institutions”.
Some of von der Leyen’s appointments failed to withstand public scrutiny, though. One of those earned another moniker: the Piepergate. A 2024 scandal revolving around the controversial appointment of German conservative Markus Pieper as SME envoy. Another non-transparent choice instead of open selection, with von der Leyen failing to explain what “additional qualifications” Pieper had, that elevated him above other candidates. Instead, Pieper resigned after only a day on the job.
The list goes on.
The Queen of Opacity
The European Ombudsman is mostly powerless against von der Leyen’s missteps. If the Commission President is caught doing something illegal or unethical (for example when she accepts the invitation of Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis for a three-day, free-of-charge private stay at his villa in Chania, Crete right before the vote on her second term), the ombudsman can only issue strongly worded criticism (the Brussels equivalent of a slap on the wrist), but has no real power to punish the President. And if the Commission says with a one year delay that it was a private visit and was “not of ethical concern”, then that’s the end of the story.
If someone would become too much of a bother, Ursula von der Leyen and the Commission can rely on the hundreds of NGOs involved in the Commission’s LIFE program: their pockets stuffed with millions of EU grants, they work tirelessly to promote the EU’s green programs. In the European Parliament, for example. The (currently) last on the list of scandals is connected to the deregulation omnibus announced in November 2024; the legal package supposedly meant to cut red tape and launch a series of business-friendly initiatives. A significant simplification agenda high on von der Leyen’s to do list for her second term – and much like many things in her realm, something coming from top-down, without prior consultations within the Commission itself.
Alas, the Commission President fell back to her favourite mechanism of secretive dealings with industry representatives.
According to one estimate, Commission officials held about 600 one-on-one meetings with lobbyists about the details of the omnibus(es), yet no detailed notes were published of what happened in the meetings.
A clear violation of the Commission’s own decision about the number of meetings that must be made public. Thus far, the Ombudsman has opened an inquiry, to which the Commission replied, following the familiar pattern, rejecting “the claims of lacking transparency or democratic process”. Because obviously, a note describing a meeting between the cabinet of Economy Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis and the European Round Table for Industry as “ERT inquired about the proposals regarding the first omnibus proposal. Head of Cabinet gave an overview of the state of play” is detailed enough for the public to know what happened on that meeting, ensuring that deregulation also took citizens’ interests into account.
Nobody denies the necessity of simplifying the EU’s enormous load of regulations. It’s just the question of how it is being managed.
Though at the start of her first mandate, von der Leyen publicly emphasized transparency as a priority, scandals like Pfizergate have undermined these commitments in the eyes of the public.
Transparency is nothing more than an empty slogan, behind which the Commission President tries to hide. When even Commission staff complains that von der Leyen’s inner circle often gives confusing, contradictory or misleading information or plainly refuses to adhere to the transparency regulations, there is a problem of credibility. And critics from all over Brussels agree that von der Leyen’s centralized leadership style has rendered the Commission far less transparent: it’s basically the Commission President and her small circle of trusted aides who make the decisions.
Opposition grows against von der Leyen, she has already faced three no-confidence votes. This year. But until one succeeds, the Commission President can continue her work to support multinational companies.