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State of the Union Address 2026 by Ursula von der Leyen, President of the European Commission: statement by Valérie Hayer, Chair of the Renew Europe Group in the European Parliament

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To the chair of the Renew Europe Group,

Valerie President, Prime Minister.

President, I listened to your speech with great interest, and yes, you're right, Europe must move forward on its path of independence and power. But I'd go further.

We need to defend a new vision, a positive vision.

Pro-European radicalism is what we want because the summer we've just experienced is the perfect symp synthesis of the challenges facing Europe.

We failed in our migratory solidarity in CETA because of, among other things, Ms. Maloney's hypocrisy.

We had the referendum in Iceland and what it reveals about our attractiveness.

We had the AFD victory in Saxony-Anhalt, and of course we all suffered a historic climate crisis which we know will happen again.

So yes, ladies and gentlemen, these challenges are immense, but what I want to say today is that far from weakening us,

they must strengthen us because we have all the cards in hand to respond. We've done our bit in this Chamber. We adopted an asylum and migration pact. Let's apply it. We adopted a Greer Deal.

Let's stop unraveling it and implement it, for goodness' sake.

And when it comes to decarbonisation policy, President, we need a European law on climate resilience and risk management.

That needs to be something that we do as a priority, because decarbonisation and adaptation go hand in hand.

I say this all the more strongly because the Greer Deal is also a competitiveness pact,

an independence pact, particularly with regard to energy, and that's our first priority prosperity.

The Greer transition, like the digital transition,

reminds us of one thing the standard of living of Europeans during the coming years depends on our ability to innovate in disruptive technologies Greer tech,

AI, data centers, biotech, quantum computing. Our sovereignty is at stake. We need to invest heavily.

We need to defend our innovative businesses from unfair competition.

We need to make European public procurement a genuine weapon as China or the US.

In a word, we need to become indispensable to the rest of the world.

We also need to take global leadership for a legal framework on AI as we once did on nuclear power, because, quite honestly,

it's not normal for it to be the Pope and the Vatican to be the first to set a philosophical limit on the development of AI. That's our role as elected representatives. These are common sense measures. We need energy and economic independence.

We need to support our farmers, the CAP, our food security.

If we don't do that, we're condemned to subservience,

and that damages the purchasing power of Europeans, and that's not something I want to see.

Our second priority is to use our power, because this economic revolution is taking hold in a world that is shutting itself off and becoming more brutal,

and I don't want to be ashamed of Europe as I was a year ago.

Prime Minister Carney, you showed what should be done vis a vis Mr. Trump.

Refuse to compromise, retaliate, protect your interests, speak the language of power. Please.

Be aware that Canada is welcome in the European Union because we share the same values and our interests converge. Hello.

So let's go further, let's begin by all ratifying CETA.

Let's establish an economic security pact against trade coercion.

If Trump imposes tariffs, let's collectively respond with tariffs, and the same would go for China and anyone else. Let's build on each other's strengths.

Let's cultivate academic exchanges, and let's continue the strategic rapprochement between Canada and Europe on rare earths,

defense, the Arctic, energy and research.

Prime Minister, as you are fully aware, Trump,

Putin or Xi Jinping understand only one thing, the language of power.

Every time we played by the old rules, we lost. Let's look again at this summer, Russia.

Carried out an attack on Leipzig Airport yesterday.

A Danish helicopter had flares fired at it.

This sabotage, these cyberattacks, intimidation, disinformation, these are not isolated events. They're differing dimensions of the same strategy. And what do we do?

Well, we just react often too little and often too late. President, we need to change our doctrine.

We need to make it clear to Putin that if he attacks us, It'll cost him,

and we must also make it clear to Putin that we will continue to support Ukraine.

Finally, ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to conclude by my remarks by addressing the pro-Europeans here.

We face threats and challenges, but given that, we must defend a new, deeply optimistic vision pro European radicalism.

We need to do more, we need more Europe, and we need it more quickly.

We need to speed up our legislative agenda.

Ms von der Leyen, thank you for the announcement of this law to protect minors online.

Thank you for this idea of the European Security Council. We fully support you.

Now tell us what we can do to help you.

We must deliver, and we must also implement the laws that we've adopted for, and here.

We're not there yet on the DSA, the Digital Services Act, on critical raw materials, the rule of law.

I can't name everything, but we have the legislation.

It's the Commission's responsibility now to implement it.

Ladies and gentlemen, Europe must free itself from its taboos.

It must benefit from new transfers of sovereignty validated by the people of Europe.

It needs powerful tools and reformed institutions so that it can be more efficient, and it also needs an ambitious budget.

And for that, there's only one possible majority, one possible majority. It's our pro European majority.

It's key for cooperation and trust to be restored among us.

That's the only way we can deliver for Europeans.

It's the only way we can deliver this power based agenda with Europeans and without extremists.

We also need to increase our sphere of influence and become a safe haven for democrats all around the world.

Prime Minister Carney, in the face of the reactionary international context, let's build this alliance of democracies. Colleagues, Nothing is set in stone.

Just think of the European Union 10 years ago.

Who would have imagined then that we would have a Europe of defense, a Europe of health, a recovery plan.

So let's be proud, let's be ambitious, let's be radical, let's be pro-European.

Media information
ID I-293069
Date 16/09/2026
Duration 07:18
Personalities Valérie Hayer
Institution European Parliament
Views 1183

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