Von der Leyen names European Commission's new top team

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00:00The complications started over the summer when President von der Leyen requested that

00:04national capitals each put forward two nominees, a man and a woman, so that she'd have more

00:10flexibility in fulfilling her campaign pledge to have a gender-balanced commission.

00:15However, the member states rebuffed her request.

00:17They didn't send two people, only I think two countries actually did that, and the vast

00:22majority of them nominated men.

00:24So this has been a very difficult position for von der Leyen.

00:27Now the College of Commissioners is a bit like a president's cabinet, except in a national

00:33system, of course, a prime minister or president would be able to choose who is in their cabinet.

00:37That's not how it works in the EU.

00:39The national governments, the member states, get to choose who is in the cabinet, and the

00:42president gets to decide what they do, what their portfolios are.

00:47And the reason that those national governments rejected von der Leyen's request is this was

00:50a bit of a power struggle.

00:52They were saying, you don't get to decide who's in your cabinet, we decide.

00:57So von der Leyen had to work with what she had.

00:58So she was going around to countries, especially smaller countries, and saying, look, if you

01:03rescind your male nominee and replace them with a female nominee, I will give that person

01:08a bigger portfolio, a more powerful portfolio.

01:11That worked with Slovenia.

01:12Slovenia rescinded its male nominee, put forward Marta Kos.

01:16However, then Kos has encountered opposition from the Janis Jansa-led center-right opposition

01:22in Slovenia, and so that still can't go forward.

01:25Unfortunately, that nomination is still not official.

01:27So even if we get names today, which is in doubt, there can be no Slovenian name.

01:32Then there was also controversy over the Italian nominee, Raffaele Fito.

01:37He is from the far-right Brothers of Italy party of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Maloney.

01:41And the rumor has been that he was going to get an executive vice president position that

01:46has angered members of the parliament from the left and liberals who are questioning

01:49why von der Leyen would be rewarding the far right with a high-profile position when both

01:54Maloney and her party refused to vote for von der Leyen's reappointment for a second

01:59term.

02:00And then we have the dramatic developments yesterday with Thierry Breton, the incredibly

02:04powerful commissioner during von der Leyen's first term, suddenly resigned, accusing von

02:09der Leyen of sabotaging him by going to President Macron and essentially saying, I don't have

02:15the power to reject Breton, but I can't work with him anymore.

02:17So if you insist that he's the nominee, I'm going to give him a bad portfolio.

02:21And so Macron replaced him with Stéphane Séjourné.

02:24The big question, will Séjourné get a major portfolio as seemed to be the quid pro quo,

02:29probably with the title executive vice president attached?

02:31That's what we'll learn today.

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