“It is because of you that Europe was able to act on the Green Deal,” Eickhout said, appealing to his young audience to vote in June. He then pressed on von der Leyen, accusing her of abandoning her mission prematurely. “We are now at a crossroads between continuing with the Green Deal or returning to the gridlock of fossil fuel development.”
Climate change remains a major issue for many young people. Eickhout, who repeatedly received the loudest applause, won the vote to become the next committee chairman, which was held both indoors and online. The university's students shaped the debate, which was co-hosted with POLITICO, choosing climate change as the opening topic.
Ms von der Leyen tried to convince her audience, many of whom will be voting for the first time in June's election, that she was being real about climate change.
“Four years ago, I set out the Climate Act and a vision for climate neutrality by 2050,” she said. “It has to be implemented so that it actually happens on the ground.” But like most candidates, she has no choice but to authorize a capital markets union to boost private investment in Europe's green infrastructure. and offered few specific details about how that would be accomplished.
The occasion served as a reminder to Europe's centre-right of the cost of compromising on environmental ambitions.
Eickhout's attacks focused on von der Leyen's center-right European People's Party, which has pushed for a series of environmental policy rollbacks in recent months. Most notably, they rebelled against her landmark legislative proposal to restore 20 percent of the EU's land and waters.
