EU budget negotiations are never easy, but this time they may be even more complicated, for several reasons. First, the EU has shifted its pri­orities to defence, economic security and com­petitiveness. These are new areas that will re­quire long-term investments at EU level, besides the more traditional budget items, such as agri­culture and cohesion. Second, the EU will have to phase out the NextGenerationEU funds by the end of 2026, which means it will have to repay debts of around€25 billion annually. This does not include the cessation of the NextGenera­tionEU money, which has been supporting the 27 member states for the past six years and will no longer be available in the new budgetary pe­riod. Third, political shifts in member states in recent years mean that there is little consensus on the strategic direction the EU should take, and the extent of the European Commission’s decision-making and agenda-setting powers. The negotiators from the three EU institutions will have the difficult job of trying to square a cir­cle, namely to reserve sufficient money for long­term strategic projects and investments, despite the short-term national interests of the 27 mem ­ber states and the plethora of particular interests in the different policy fields, such as agriculture, tech and energy. In addition, the negotiators have to work with a particularly tight budget. The EU budget is worth only 1 per cent of EU27 GNI, and almost two-thirds flows back directly to the member states through the Common Agricultural Policy(CAP) and the cohesion funds. 7 In compari­son to the size of the EU budget, France spends roughly 57 per cent of its GDP on its national budget and Germany 48 per cent. 8 The Commission’s proposal is quite ambitious, at €2 trillion for the next seven-year-period(in cur ­rent prices). This figure includes inflation fore­casts over the next decade. In real 2025 terms, this represents a total budget of€1.763 trillion. 9 In addition, the Commission has dared to imple­ment a fairly consequential reconfiguration of the budgetary architecture. It has streamlined 52 existing budget lines into 16, with two main pil ­lars: the National and Regional Partnership Plans(NRRPs), which include the Common Agri­cultural Policy and cohesion funding and repre­sent 48 per cent of the total budget(€771 billion in 2025 prices); and the European Competitive ­ness Fund, which includes directly managed EU funds and makes up approximately 23 per cent of the budget proposal. 10 The Commission also proposes to change the disbursement mecha­nisms, inspired by the Recovery and Resilience Plans of the NextGenerationEU funding, and has added more flexibility and emergency funding into the mix. While these changes are necessary in view of the changed geopolitical environment and new priorities, they also bear certain risks with regard to support for democracy. 5. The EU’s new programme for democracy support: AgoraEU The Commission announced three programmes for internal democracy support under the head­ing»Investing in education, democracy and Eu­ropean values«. These include Erasmus+ for edu­cation, the Justice Programme, as well as the new, streamlined AgoraEU programme, which integrates three different funding strands: the previously existing Creative Europe Programme for culture and media; the also previously exist­ing Citizens, Equality, Values Programme(CERV) Programme for civil society; and the new»Me­dia+« programme, which will support independ­ent journalism, pluralism and media literacy, with a particular focus on audiovisual and news. In the 2021–2027 MFF this media funding was under the Creative Europe scheme. 7  Johannes Lindner/Romy Hansum/Nils Redeker/Eulalia Rubio(2025): Ripe for Reform – What’s in the EU Budget Proposal and What Should Come Next, Jacques Delors Centre(July). 8  International Monetary Fund(2023): Government expenditure, percent of GDP. 9 Ibid. 10  European Commission(2025): EU budget 2028–2034 explained: Priorities, funding, and what it means for you(July). 6 Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung e.V.