Alberto Alemanno

Just wow projects.propublica.org/trump-team-f...

Join OGP’s Europe Dialogue webinar to see how openness and efficiency can go hand in hand.

🗓 Mar 12
🎙 Speakers: @alemanno.bsky.social, Dr. Dominik Böllhoff, Mathilde Bouyé, Jorge Lagarto, Thierry Lambert, Carina Paju

🔗 bit.ly/simplification-12mar

President von der Leyen just declared that Europe “can no longer be a custodian” of the rules-based order, the same order the EU was built on: binding rules, institutions above states, disputes settled by law not power.

Cui bono? ec.europa.eu/commission/p...

Ursula von der Leyen faces blowback over diplomatic ‘overreach’ As the Iran conflict enters its second week, European Commission president is overstepping her role and wading onto their turf, national diplomats say.

The HR/VP post was designed to unite Europe’s foreign policy. Kallas is now being used to protect its divisions.

Member states are deploying her as a brake protecting national prerogatives while appearing to defend European institutional integrity.

www.politico.eu/article/ursu...

Pedro Sánchez’s lone stance against Trump may look risky, but it is cannily pragmatic | Eoghan Gilmartin The Spanish PM’s defiant foreign policy line may seem outspoken. The truth is that he is a sound strategist at home and abroad, says journalist Eoghan Gilmartin

Europe is shifting from passive acceptance of #Iran war to open denunciation. And that shift is vindicating Sanchez.
He was there first, as he was on Gaza, where the rest of Europe eventually caught up
His ability to seize political momentum is unmatched www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

As predicted, France, the UK, Italy, and mie Germany are now acknowledging, carefully and belatedly, what Spain said out loud from day one about Trump and Netanyahu’s Iran war:

reckless, unlawful, and strategically empty.

Courage, it turns out, has a lag time.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Dismissing Spanish PM Sánchez’s positions on Iran, Gaza or Venezuela as ‘just domestic politics’ is simplistic at best and lazy at worse:

Every leader’s foreign policy has electoral logic.

Ironically, ‘it’s populism’ is itself a populist move.

Is the tide turning?

Canada, the United Kingdom, France, and even Italy are now following the path opened by Spain in claiming international law and preventing the use of their bases to attack Iran.

Is the tide turning?

Canada, the United Kingdom, France, and even Italy are now following the path opened by Spain in claiming international law and preventing the use of their bases to attack Iran.

Spanish PM Sánchez is being punished TWICE: first by Trump for refusing to allow US bases & now by the EU Parliament’s right majority for being on the “wrong” side of a culture war

The EPP’s refusal to debate the issue legitimises Trump. Shameful to most Europeans

www.euronews.com/my-europe/20...

Honored to present at the @ecb.europa.eu Legal Colloquium today on the constitutional risks of the EU’s simplification agenda.

Invoking “urgency” cannot justify bypassing impact assessments, public consultations & the rule of law.

The @ombudsman.europa.eu agreed

Good to ask the newbie!

At this point expressing support for Spain equals standing up for Europe.

Isn’t about time each and every EU national leader expresses solidarity and support with Spain 🇪🇸 ?

Honored to present at the @ecb.europa.eu Legal Colloquium today on the constitutional risks of the EU’s simplification agenda.

Invoking “urgency” cannot justify bypassing impact assessments, public consultations & the rule of law.

The @ombudsman.europa.eu agreed

Spanish opposition leader parrots Trump-style demands in attacking @sanchezcastejon’s principled rejection of US/Israeli strikes on Iran & refusal to let US forces use Spanish bases

A gambit that undermines his own credibility & electoral prospects for @partido-popular.bsky.social

The Iran war has revealed something Europeans had forgotten: the US depends on Europe as much as Europe depends on US

In denying the Pentagon use of its bases, Spanish PM Sánchez revealed a strategic leverage Europe never thought to use

A coordinated EU stance on military base ‘d be game changer

The Iran war has revealed something Europeans had forgotten: the US depends on Europe as much as Europe depends on US

In denying the Pentagon use of its bases, Spanish PM Sánchez revealed a strategic leverage Europe never thought to use

A coordinated EU stance on military base ‘d be game changer

Von der Leyen is losing - not gaining - power:

By speaking where she has no mandate, she’s alienating her own College, enraging member states, and betting EU credibility on Trump’s war aims.

A Commission president who has lost the Council (!) doesn’t need to wait for 2029 to become irrelevant

Von der Leyen is losing - not gaining - power:

By speaking where she has no mandate, she’s alienating her own College, enraging member states, and betting EU credibility on Trump’s war aims.

A Commission president who has lost the Council (!) doesn’t need to wait for 2029 to become irrelevant

IRAN is America’s war, Europe’s consequences:

⛽ Energy shocks
🚢 Refugee waves
📈 Far-right surge on arrival
⚖️ Rules-based order

Washington gets the geopolitical prize, if it works.

Europe foots the bill, either way.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Von der Leyen backs regime change in Iran, contradicting the position of EU national governments, and endorsing Merz’s supportive stance.

2 issues:
- she has no authority to say/do that
- she is not even asking the US something in return (Ukraine’s support)

www.euronews.com/2026/03/01/i...

Trump’s Iran strikes are textbook diversionary war: when approval ratings fall, bombs fall too.

But this time the bombs blew open fault lines everywhere:

🇺🇸 MAGA splits
🫏 Democrats fracture

🇪🇺 Europe divides

🌐 The ‘West’ fractures

It’s a diversion war

IRAN Another “preemptive strike”, another violation of international law.

Preemptive force is only legal under a clear, imminent threat.

What we’re seeing looks less like self-defense and more like regime change by other means.

Echoing @alemanno.bsky.social: The HR's statement is considerably and surprisingly unbalanced.

Have we now even given up on paying lip service to a rules-based order, in which a war of aggression presents the most outright violation of the UN Charta? An EU acquiescence to the law of the jungle?

IRAN Another “preemptive strike”, another violation of international law.

Preemptive force is only legal under a clear, imminent threat.

What we’re seeing looks less like self-defense and more like regime change by other means.

The EU is undergoing Treaty change. You just weren’t supposed to notice.

5 reforms to EU law-making. No Convention. No ratification. No democratic debate.

I call it the Castle Method — and it’s constitutional drift hiding in plain sight.

🔗 verfassungsblog.de/the-castle-method/​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

The EU is undergoing Treaty change. You just weren’t supposed to notice.

5 reforms to EU law-making. No Convention. No ratification. No democratic debate.

I call it the Castle Method — and it’s constitutional drift hiding in plain sight.

🔗 verfassungsblog.de/the-castle-method/​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

OLAF investigates Mandelson!

Earlier today, @thegoodlobby.bsky.social Profs had "formally called on European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen to open an immediate inquiry into the conduct of former EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson"