Fidesz MEP: EP using left-wing pressure tactics on rule-of-law issue

In an interview with public broadcaster Kossuth Radio, Deutsch said that in his 12 years as an MEP he had “never seen the EP pass such a tacky resolution” as it had this past week when it declared it was prepared to take legal action against the commission if it delayed the application of the mechanism in the European Union’s budget that links EU funding to the rule of law.

“The European Parliament’s left-wing majority, including the European People’s Party, is employing political pressure tactics on the issue made out to be about the rule of law,” Deutsch said.

He called the resolution “an open threat” against the EC on the part of the legislative body’s “left-wing majority”.

Deutsch insisted that Hungary’s leftist MEPs were also “doing everything in their power to go against their own home country”. He said they were “working to keep the rule-of-law mechanism alive” to deprive Hungarian SMEs and local councils along with the country’s education and health-care systems of the EU funding they are entitled to.

The European and Hungarian left, he insisted, were looking to punish every country whose voters “had the courage to go against the European mainstream and choose civil, nationally-minded, centre-right conservative governments”.