Brussels Playbook: Lex Tusk uproar — Migration row is back (again) — Chinese cyberattack concerns

TODAY’S MUST-READ: We profile the EU commissioner who Brussels insiders say is quiet quitting. Read the story here.

POLAND GOES AFTER OPPOSITION

EU AND US SLAM POLAND’S ‘LEX TUSK’: Alarm bells are going off in EU capitals and Washington over a new Polish law that will allow a government commission to ban people from holding public office — potentially blocking opposition candidates from running in this year’s elections.

“The new law is a tool of political intimidation and persecution to prevent change at the next elections in Poland,” Manfred Weber, leader of the center-right European People’s Party, told Playbook. “It is a legislative scandal in the heart of Europe.”

What’s in it: The new bill, which President Andrzej Duda said he will sign into law, would create a commission meant to investigate Russian influence in Polish politics. The commission would have the power to ban people from public office for a decade. Poland’s ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party say it’s an effort to root out Kremlin agents. Poland has been at the forefront supporting Ukraine since Russia’s full-scale invasion began last year.

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But the real target could be someone else: The law comes ahead of this fall’s pivotal parliamentary election that has the ruling party and opposition in a neck-and-neck race. The opposition warns the commission is aimed at harassing political rivals — especially Donald Tusk, a former Polish prime minister and European Council president who heads the opposition Civic Platform party (a member of the EPP).

The “new legislation … could be misused to interfere with Poland’s free and fair elections,” the U.S. state department said in an unusually strong statement. “We share the concerns expressed by many observers that this law to create a commission to investigate Russian influence could be used to block the candidacy of opposition politicians without due process.”

EU vows to step in and act: “I can assure you that we will not hesitate to take immediate action as necessary when we see that there is space and need for such action,” the Commission’s Vice President for Values and Transparency Věra Jourová said during a press conference.

“We have a special concern now about the situation in Poland,” Justice Commissioner Didier Reynders told reporters. “A special committee able to deprive citizens of their right to be elected in a public office” forms the focus of concern.

Expect a debate in the European Parliament: “The EPP Group calls for a debate on the issue this week in plenary, and expects Council and Commission to take firm positions on this as well,” EPP leader Weber told Playbook.

EU SEEKS MIGRATION PACT

MIGRATION IS BACK ON THE AGENDA: EU countries are wrangling once again over migration — the topic is expected to take center stage in today’s meeting of EU ambassadors, which will lay the groundwork for the high-stakes home affairs ministers’ summit on June 8, when countries want to agree new migration rules for the entire Union.

Countries are again fighting over distributing migrants: Poland was among the first EU countries to break ranks against the planned Migration and Asylum Pact, with its home affairs minister Mariusz Kamiński tweeting at the end of last week: “There is no and there will be no consent to the forced relocation of migrants to Poland.”

No thanks: Mandatory relocations would force each EU member to take a share of migrants that arrive mostly on Europe’s Southern shores. Countries including Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic think this is a daft idea.

Carrot or stick: The Swedish Council presidency and the Commission insist that this concept is off the table, and that they are pushing for “mandatory solidarity” instead. According to the draft legislation, EU countries would be able to choose between mandatory relocations, financial contributions, or “alternative solidarity measures” such as supplying technical equipment and skilled personnel upon the request from a recipient country.

Putting a price-tag on migrants: Poland’s Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki complained Friday that this would in practice leave countries with the choice between accepting migrants or paying cash into a fund. According to Morawiecki, countries that refused mandatory relocations would have to pay €22,000 for each migrant that they don’t accept (to compensate other countries for the costs of housing people).

Digging deeper: That price tag does not appear in leaked drafts of the migration pact obtained by POLITICO, but it was floated by EU officials in a closed-door meeting, according to diplomats.

Responsibility vs. solidarity: Several Visegrád countries (the group of Central and Eastern European states that have little direct influx of migration and are most opposed to accepting new migrants from the South) are voicing concerns that the balance between responsibility and solidarity is gradually shifting toward the latter.

The Swedish presidency drafted a new proposal after the last EU ambassadors’ meeting on Friday which takes on board many requests from Mediterranean countries that are most exposed to migration flows.

One way or another: According to the draft from Friday, “mandatory responsibility offsets” will be triggered if relocation pledges fall short of 60 percent of total needs. This would set in motion a compensation mechanism where countries that don’t fulfill their relocations quota (meaning they don’t voluntarily accept enough migrants from other EU countries) wouldn’t be able to return migrants to their European country of first entry.

ALSO TODAY: EU COUNTRIES FIGHT OVER SOCIAL RIGHTS FOR PLATFORM WORKERS: The Swedish presidency of the Council will today take another shot at breaking a deadlock on the EU’s Platform Work Directive (PWD), which could reclassify millions of gig workers — such as Uber drivers, Glovo or Deliveroo food couriers — as employees, granting them more social rights and protections.

The draft law is on the agenda of today’s closed-doors meeting of the 27 deputy EU ambassadors. Time is ticking before the June 12 meeting of EU labor ministers, who want to sign off on the directive. Last week, EU countries failed to find a compromise on the issue.

There are two blocs with opposing views: A coalition favorable to reclassifying gig workers as employees, led by Spain and the Netherlands; and a coalition reluctant to do so, led by France and Poland. Germany has abstained before and can’t make up its mind (owing to a clash between the governing liberal and social-democratic parties in Berlin), while Italy was firmly in the Spanish-Dutch group but might now switch sides, according to diplomats.

UPDATE ON HUNGARY

GERMANY PILES MORE DOUBT ON HUNGARY’S EU PRESIDENCY IN 2024: “I have doubts about the extent to which Hungary will be able to lead a successful Council presidency,” Germany’s Europe Minister Anna Lührmann told reporters Tuesday, citing Hungary’s encroachment on the rule of law and wavering stance on backing Ukraine.

Budapest hits back: Hungarian Justice Minister Judit Varga dismissed the initiative to prevent its Council presidency as “nonsense” and said that the European Parliament members’ actions are “very, very” damaging for European democracies.

Stay tuned: Damaging or not, the European Parliament will Thursday vote on a resolution to prevent Hungary from taking over the presidency in 2024 — warning EU countries that Parliament will take “appropriate measures,” if the Council doesn’t block Hungary’s presidency.

Cold shower: Varga may very well end up being right with her assessment that the initiative will be fruitless. Despite the noise from Germany and the European Parliament, many in the EU see the attempt to prevent Hungary’s presidency as far-fetched.

“From a legal point of view, it is not clear how it is possible or feasible to discard … [an EU member country] from the sequency of rotating presidencies,” Juan López Aguilar, a Spanish MEP, professor of constitutional law and chair of the European Parliament’s committee on Civil Liberties and Justice, told Playbook.

Dignity and efficacy: But, López Aguilar added, “politically it is a fact, that we in the European Parliament endorse every possibility … to state clearly that as for now Hungary is in no situation to hold with dignity and efficacy the rotating presidency of the European Union.”

France was less bullish than Germany: “Hungary should already be working with Spain [which will assume the presidency in July], and we expect neutrality and impartiality,” said French European Affairs Minister Laurence Boone.

DUTCH ON CHINA AND UKRAINE

DUTCH FOREIGN MINISTER WARNS ABOUT CHINESE CYBER ATTACKS: EU heads of state and government are scheduled to have a strategic discussion on China during their summit in Brussels on June 29 and 30.

In an interview with POLITICO, Deputy Prime Minister of the Netherlands Wopke Hoekstra pointed to cybersecurity as an item of concern. “Domestic interference, but also cyber … cyber attacks stemming from Chinese soil, is something about which we are increasingly worried,” he said, echoing reports by his country’s intelligence services.

About why the Netherlands is strangling China’s microchip industry: As Playbook reported previously, the Netherlands has agreed with the U.S. and Japan to restrict China’s access to advanced microchip-printing machines. The news was massive, because the Netherlands is home to ASML, the only manufacturer outside of Japan and the U.S. of the machines, which underpin the worldwide semiconductor supply chain.

IP theft: The reason for the Dutch decision to act was “that we are worried about what we see as civil-military fusion” in China, Hoekstra said. “That we are worried about intellectual property theft, that we are worried about a non-level playing field.” More than in the past, national security concerns are part of the equation on chips, Hoekstra said.

Kiss ‘n’ tell: Hoekstra is a self-declared Henry Kissinger fan, and said he admires the German-born American diplomat “for his geopolitical knowledge, and I’ve had the privilege to have had a number of conversations with him.” He added: “I’ve read I think almost all of his books, so I always take his counsel and his wisdom very seriously.”

What about Kissinger’s counsel on Ukraine? In a recent interview with the Economist, Kissinger called Europe’s Ukraine policy “madly dangerous,” because “the Europeans are saying: ‘We don’t want them in NATO because they’re too risky,’” while at the same time arming “Ukraine to a point where it will be the best-armed country and with the least strategically experienced leadership in Europe.” Let’s hope the Russia-Ukraine war doesn’t last as long as the one Kissinger controversially won the Nobel Peace Prize for “ending.”

But Hoekstra defended Europe’s approach: “We have to think at a later stage about what the security architecture in Europe looks like and how that is sufficiently stable going forward. But, in the short and medium term — and the short to medium term might well be a number of years because I don’t think the war will be over anytime soon — there is no substitute for Ukraine being successful in the battlefield.”

IN OTHER NEWS

WOULD SOUTH AFRICA ARREST PUTIN? South Africa’s leading opposition party, the Democratic Alliance, said Tuesday it had taken legal action to force the government to arrest Russian President Vladimir Putin if he visits the country.

Putin is currently the subject of an international arrest warrant issued by the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague in March, over the forced deportation of Ukrainian children to Russia as part of Moscow’s full-scale invasion.

The DA has now launched a court application requesting Putin be “detained and surrendered” to the ICC if he were to arrive in South Africa to attend a BRICS summit in August, the party said in a statement. My colleagues Elena Giordano and Nicolas Camut have the story here.

BIDEN ACCUSER DEFECTS: Tara Reade, who in 2020 accused now-U.S. President Joe Biden of sexually assaulting her in 1993 when she worked on his staff, has defected to Russia citing fears for her safety, report several media outlets including the Daily Beast. She’s given an interview to pro-Putin news website Sputnik.

READ THIS NEXT: My colleague Jamie Dettmer has a piece on a bizarre Independence Day celebration in Liberty Square in Tbilisi, where Georgia’s prime minister and president (more on her below) delivered dueling speeches. The event is a microcosm of a Georgia that feels the pull of both Brussels and Moscow — but has seen trade with the latter jump by 20 percent since the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Georgia lost about a fifth of its territory in a brief war with Russia 15 years ago.

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AGENDA

— The European Parliament’s plenary session in Brussels will be opened by EP President Roberta Metsola and addressed by Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili at 3 p.m. Highlights: Breaches of the rule of law in Hungary at 5:30 p.m. … sexual harassment in the EU and MeToo evaluation at 7:30 p.m. Agenda. Watch.

— European Union-United States Trade and Technology Council (TTC) meeting in Luleå, Sweden. Doorsteps at 8 a.m. … press conference at 3:20 p.m. European Commission Executive Vice Presidents Margrethe Vestager, Valdis Dombrovskis, and Commissioner Thierry Breton participate. Watch.

— EP press conference: Breaches of the Rule of Law and fundamental rights in Hungary and frozen EU funds at 11 a.m. Watch.

— Informal meeting of the NATO ministers of foreign affairs in Oslo, Norway; press conference at 2:30 p.m. Watch.

— Roberta Metsola attends ceremony to mark the naming of the European Parliament’s Witold Pilecki meeting room at 10:30 a.m.; meets President of Georgia Salome Zourabichvili at 2:35 p.m.

— Commission President Ursula von der Leyen at the GLOBSEC 2023 Bratislava Forum. Keynote speech “Steeled in Battle: A More United Europe after Ukraine?” at 10:30 a.m. … she’ll later head to Chișinău to meet Moldovan president Maia Sandu and the duo will deliver a joint press conference at 4:45 p.m. Watch.

— Also at GLOBSEC today: French President Emmanuel Macron speaks at 1:45 p.m.

— EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell is also in Chișinău for the Launch of the European Union Partnership Mission in Moldova at 5:30 p.m.

— Screening of the movie “Slava Ukraini” by Bernard-Henri Lévy in the European Parliament from 6 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. in room PHS 5 B001.

— Commissioner Kadri Simson in Hannover, Germany: meets Economy and Climate Minister Robert Habeck … visits the green hydrogen project SALCOS of Salzgitter AG to celebrate the anniversary of REPowerEU … visits the Salzgitter AG site. Press statements at 6:55 p.m. Watch.

— Spain’s General Secretary of the Treasury, Carlos Cuerpo, presents Madrid’s candidacy to house the headquarters of the new European Anti-Money Laundering Authority. Press briefing at 5 p.m., official presentation at 6:30 p.m. at the Spanish permanent representation to the EU in Brussels.

BRUSSELS CORNER

SPOTTED: LUIGI DI MAIO STRUGGLING TO GET INTO COMMISSION HQ: Even Italy’s former foreign minister doesn’t get an easier time from the notoriously bureaucratic procedure to get accreditation to enter the Commission headquarters, a.k.a. the Berlaymont.

A Playbook mole spotted (and photographed) Di Maio (who secured a soft landing with a job as the EU’s brand new “special representative for the Gulf region”) at the Commission’s welcome desk last afternoon, as he waited to get a badge. Even after our mole had passed security, Di Maio was still there, waiting to be let in.

COMEDY SHOW ALERT: The second edition of stand-up comedy show Brussels Belly Laughs — featuring POLITICO’s hilarious Giovanna Coi and Charlie Stevens — takes place on Friday, June 2 at La Plume Persée in Ixelles. Get your tickets now.

BIRTHDAYS: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán turns 60; Former MEPs José Ignacio Salafranca Sánchez-Neyra and Barbara Spinelli; POLITICO Europe’s Nicolas Sennegon; John Prescott, former U.K. deputy prime minister.

THANKS to Gregorio Sorgi, Suzanne Lynch, Stuart Lau, Jacopo Barigazzi, Pieter Haeck, Stuart Lau, Giorgio Leali, Playbook reporter Ketrin Jochecová and editor Joe Stanley-Smith.

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