The 2024 European Parliament (EP) elections were a mixed bag. There are no uniform trends across Europe. The results vary too much from country to country for that. Despite slight losses, the democratic party families continue to represent Europe’s stable middle ground. At the same time, the right-wing fringes of the party spectrum have gained substantially. The right-wing parties’ gains in parliament come primarily from France, Germany and Italy. It is not yet possible to say what parliamentary groups the parties to the right of centre will form. However, Ursula von der Leyen is once again likely to become Commission President, as her current coalition partners still have a majority in the Parliament (albeit a smaller one than in 2019) and she will probably have the support of the heads of government. Nevertheless, the political shifts in Europe will make it harder in future to find stable majorities for constructive solutions, especially in conflict-prone areas such as securing the peace, climate action and migration policy.