03 September 2026
Nobody Called Karlsruhe Captured
On 24 August 2026, Manfred Weber and Valérie Hayer wrote to Ursula von der Leyen asking the Commission to make the disbursement of Romania’s final tranche of €770 million under the Recovery and Resilience Facility conditional on the fate of a national statute. The letter arrived a week after the Romanian Constitutional Court had ruled on that statute in Decision 883 of 17 August 2026. The letter is right that something is wrong with Decision 883. However, the letter mischaracterises a contested and badly reasoned judgment as the output of a captured institution. Continue reading >>
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03 September 2026
Romania’s Retroactive Amendment Constitutionally Upheld
At the end of this month, German-Romanian mayor of Timișoara, Dominic Fritz, is set to lose his mayorship. His removal comes as a consequence of a newly enacted amendment to the law governing Romania’s National Integrity Agency, which violates both the principle of nonretroactivity and the electoral rights of European Union citizens. Urgent action is necessary at Union level in order to prevent serious harm to the values and principles underpinning the Union’s constitutional order flowing from Article 2 of the Treaty on European Union. Continue reading >>
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