BRUSSELS — The European Union will not backtrack on its ban on Russian fossil fuel imports or slow down its shift to renewables, even as the war in Iran sends energy costs soaring, Energy Commissioner Dan Jørgensen said Tuesday. “There is no road back to dependency on Russian energy,” Jørgensen said at a panel at POLITICO’s Competitive Europe Summit. “We should not again ever import as much as one molecule.” Jørgensen argued Europe has been for “too long” indirectly financing Russia’s war against Ukraine by buying Russian energy. “Russia has blackmailed member states … They have weaponized energy against us,” he said. His remarks come as a small group of EU leaders push for a rethink of the bloc’s relationship with Russia, which threatens to upend the implementation of the EU’s historic phase-out of Russian gas. The Commission is set to propose a similar ban on oil later this year. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán has been among the most vocal advocates for revived Russian trade, calling on the EU to suspend sanctions on Moscow, while Belgian Prime Minister Bart de Wever said the EU ought to negotiate with Russia to eventually “regain access to cheap energy.” Jørgensen argued Europe is now in a far stronger position than during the 2022 energy crisis, when Russia supplied roughly 45 percent of the bloc’s gas. That dependence has since dropped sharply to around 10 percent. “We were so vulnerable, and we never want to be in such a vulnerable situation again,” he said. While acknowledging the political backlash against climate rules and the need for short-term support for households and industry, Jørgensen insisted support for renewables was strong. “There is not any real discussion in Europe on whether we need more renewables and to move away from this dependency,” he said.

LONDON — Police launched an investigation Monday after four ambulances belonging to a Jewish community ambulance service were set on fire in north London. The Metropolitan Police were called to Golders Green, where there is a large Jewish community, early Monday after four Hatzalah ambulances were set alight. In a statement the Met said the arson attack is being treated as an “antisemitic hate crime.” Keir Starmer condemned the “deeply shocking antisemitic arson attack.” Writing on X, the British prime minister said: “My thoughts are with the Jewish community who are waking up this morning to this horrific news. Antisemitism has no place in our society.” Health Secretary Wes Streeting echoed Starmer’s comments calling the event a “sickening attack on Jewish ambulances.” He urged the public to “stand together against antisemitic hatred.” No injuries were reported and the fires have since been put out, but nearby houses were evacuated as a precaution. Explosions linked to the attack were also reported. The Met said it believes those were linked to gas canisters on the ambulances. The attack comes months after two people were killed in a terrorist attack at a Manchester synagogue last October. Superintendent Sarah Jackson said police are looking for three suspects. “We know this incident will cause a great deal of community concern and officers remain on scene to carry out urgent enquiries,” she added.

ZAGROS MOUNTAINS, Iraq — About 5 kilometers from Iran, aircraft roar overhead. Are the planes American, Israeli, Iranian? The Kurdish fighter shrugged and urged haste. The final stretch to his militia’s base could be reached only on foot, along a steep path covered in loose rock. Out in the open, everyone is vulnerable. A tunnel leads to the underground base in a sliver of the Zagros Mountains in northeastern Iraq. The Iranian-Kurdish guerrilla group, the Kurdistan Free Life Party, is careful to keep its exact location secret. Visitors must switch their smartphones to flight mode before handing them over upon entry. The Kurdistan Free Life Party is in waiting mode, poised along Iran’s western border to move in if a weakened regime opens up a path to strike it. The Axel Springer Global Reporters Network, which includes POLITICO, was granted rare access to the group’s base and its members, who discussed its ideology, goals and under what conditions they’d go into Iran. Militia representative Bahar Avrin said in an interview inside the base that the organization already has elements “inside” Iran, and that deploying a larger force against Tehran is ultimately a question of the right timing and conditions. The border between northern Iraq and Iran runs through the Zagros Mountains and is considered porous — for smugglers, locals and the handful of militias operating there. The Kurdistan Free Life Party, often referred to by its Kurdish acronym PJAK, is part of a coalition of six Kurdish militia groups that want to topple Iran’s Islamist regime and usher in a government that is more democratic and grants more rights and autonomy to Iranian Kurds in Iran. President Donald Trump has said Iraqi and Iranian Kurdish groups are “willing” to participate in a ground offensive against Tehran — but he has said he ruled out the idea to avoid making the war “any more complex than it already is.” A Kurdish assault could spark a sectarian power struggle that destabilizes Iran. And key U.S. allies with their own Kurdish minorities — Iraq and Turkey — have warned the idea could spread unrest elsewhere in the Middle East. The idea could nonetheless prove tempting for Trump as the war, now in its third week, drags on. The ruling regime in Tehran has not capitulated despite punishing airstrikes that have killed scores of its top leaders. Trump could find himself looking for military options that do not trigger the political risk that would accompany deployment of U.S. ground troops. “The president never takes anything fully off the table,” said Victoria Coates, who served as deputy national security adviser for the Middle East in Trump’s first term. “And if you were considering this, this is the last thing you would want the Iranians to know.” TUNNEL VISION PJAK looks ready to go into a fight, with a base that suggests an organized military operation. It consists of a tunnel system running through the mountain’s interior, with electricity and running water. On the walls hang photographs of fallen fighters — many of them young, women and men in their 20s and 30s. Four monitors mounted to the walls display the surrounding terrain outside. Motion sensors control the cameras; when a bird flutters across the screen, the image switches to it automatically. In a dark tunnel, a 20-year-old fighter holding an assault rifle introduced herself as Zilan. Her day begins at 5:30 a.m. and follows a strict schedule. “Our daily life is based on discipline,” she said. Ideological instruction aims at building a democratic society; military training focuses on defending the Kurdish people.Watch: The Conversation “We never want the help of foreign powers like Israel and the United States,” she said. “We are an independent party.” The Kurdistan Free Life Party is one of several Iranian-Kurdish groups in Iraq. In 1979, Kurds in Iran supported the revolution against the shah. When the new Islamic Republic rejected their demands for autonomy, heavy fighting broke out in Iranian Kurdistan. Numerous groups relocated to Iraq, where they now operate freely in northern Iraq, which is largely autonomous from the rest of the country and detached from the central government in Baghdad. The six members of the political and military alliance are not in agreement about whether to invade if called on, and under what conditions they would embark on a full-scale war for their political goals. Some parties appear eager to take on a ground offensive in Iran. Reza Kaabi, secretary-general of the Komala of the Toilers of Kurdistan, has even set out a blueprint, declaring a U.S.-enforced no-fly zone to be a prerequisite for any Kurdish invasion. There is a general sense in the region that PJAK — given its proximity to the Iranian border and its relatively strong military presence — would be one of the first of the six Kurdish militias in the coalition to go into Iran if given U.S. military support. But PJAK publicly rejects the idea that they would do so at the bidding of Washington. It’s a stance rooted in distrust of the U.S. — not least because the United States abruptly withdrew support from the Kurds in Syria in January. Asked under what conditions PJAK would launch an offensive across the Iraqi-Iranian border, Avrin declined to answer. But, she said, her organization has “never waited for any force to bring about change.” CNN recently reported that just a few days into the Iran war, Trump spoke with Mustafa Hijri, the secretary-general of another group in the Kurdish-Iranian opposition alliance: the Democratic Party of Iranian Kurdistan, or PDKI. It is one of the oldest Iranian-Kurdish opposition parties and has maintained armed units operating from exile in northern Iraq. PDKI executive committee member Hassan Sharafi said in an interview that he could “neither confirm nor deny” whether such a conversation had taken place, in part because of the limited contact among the group’s leadership maintained for security reasons. Sharafi said the PDKI had “no operational relations” with the United States on the ground in Iraq. At the political level, however, contacts exist: “In Washington, Paris, and London we have contacts, and our representatives there maintain relations. Our relations are diplomatic and political.” Such links, he said, were long-standing: “For more than 20 years we have had relations with the United States and with all European countries. We have contacts with all of them.” THE ROAD TO TEHRAN From Tehran’s perspective, the militias represent a serious threat. Iranian artillery has struck in the border region multiple times in recent days, hitting villages near the frontier. These attacks primarily affect civilians. The Kurdish guerrillas sheltered inside the mountain remain protected. Other militia groups, whose positions are located in more exposed terrain, have also come under fire. A 2023 security agreement between Iran and Iraq obliged Baghdad to disarm Iranian-Kurdish opposition groups, dismantle their bases and relocate them deeper into Iraqi territory. Now that the Kurdish groups are openly considering an offensive in Iran, Tehran has concluded that the agreement has failed, according to Kamaran Osman, an Iraq-based human rights officer with a nonprofit organization called Community Peacemaker Teams that monitors human rights abuses in conflict zones. “Now it believes it must target, destroy and defeat these groups,” Osman said, speaking in the Iraqi city of Sulaymaniyah, about a two-hour drive from the PJAK base. As of Monday, his organization had recorded 307 Iranian attacks on the Kurdistan region in Iraq, leaving eight people killed and 51 injured. He sees only grim scenarios for the Kurdish people in Iran. “If the regime falls, there is a risk of civil war in Iran,” he said. If the regime survives, he fears more retaliation from Tehran against Kurds in Iraq — both Iranian-Kurdish opposition groups and the Kurdistan Regional Government. Should northern Iraq become destabilized, a power vacuum could emerge. The last time order eroded here, in 2014, ISIS militants seized control of a swathe of territory stretching from Iraq to Syria, a landmass nearly as large as the United Kingdom. PJAK has ties to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, a militant group that has fought against the Turkish government, and is listed as a terrorist organization there — as well as in the EU and the U.S. The United States has a troubled history of making big promises to ethnic Kurdish groups — and then abandoning them at the worst possible moment. After calling on Iraqis to rise up and overthrow then-dictator Saddam Hussein in 1991, President George H.W. Bush declined to intervene when Hussein began slaughtering Iraqi Kurds who took up the U.S. president’s call. And as recently as this January, the Trump administration stood by as a Syrian Kurdish militia that led the U.S.-backed campaign to defeat ISIS just a few years ago was attacked by Syria’s new government. The big question for U.S. policymakers may be how much they would need to support a Kurdish assault on Iran to make it successful. Former U.S. intelligence and special forces experts believe it would require the type of commitment he might prefer to avoid: large infusions of cash and weapons, close air support, and potentially even on-the-ground aid from U.S. special forces. Even then, a Kurdish-led attack could fizzle, leaving Trump with two grim choices: Abandon the Kurds, or come to their rescue with even greater U.S. combat support. “It would require a lot of commitment on the U.S. side with a very unclear end state,” said Alex Plitsas, a former senior Pentagon official who worked on special operations and counterterrorism policy in the Middle East. While Coates cautioned that Trump had other, better options at hand, she argued that even modest U.S. military support for the Kurds — such as small arms shipments and limited air support — could threaten Iran’s increasingly brittle regime. The key, she said, was arming the exiled Kurds in Iraq in conjunction with other Iranian resistance groups inside the country to avoid the perception it was coming from outside. “The way this is going to be effective,” Coates said, “is not by a bunch of Iraqis invading Iran.” Drüten of WELT reported from Iraq. Sakellariadis reported from Washington. The Axel Springer Global Reporters Network is a multi-publication initiative publishing scoops, investigations, interviews, op-eds and analysis that reverberate across the world. It connects journalists from Axel Springer brands — including POLITICO, Business Insider, WELT, BILD, and Onet — on major stories for an international audience. Their ambitious reporting stretches across Axel Springer platforms: online, print, TV and audio. Together, the outlets reach hundreds of millions of people worldwide.

President Donald Trump has often frustrated European allies with his overt entreaties to Russian President Vladimir Putin and harsh words for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. But behind the seeming imbalance is a longer-term strategic goal – countering China. The Trump administration believes that incentivizing Russia to end the war in Ukraine, welcoming it back economically and showering it with U.S. investments, could eventually shift the global order away from China. It’s a gamble – and one Ukrainians are concerned with – but it underscores the administration’s belief that the biggest geopolitical threat facing the United States and the West is China, not Putin’s Russia. While countering China isn’t the only reason the administration wants a truce, it does help explain why after more than 15 months of fruitless talks and multiple threats to walk away, the president’s team – special envoy Steve Witkoff and son-in-law Jared Kushner – keep looking for a breakthrough. A Trump administration official, granted anonymity to discuss ongoing negotiations, said finding a “way to align closer with Russia” could create “a different power balance with China that could be very, very beneficial.” The administration’s desire to use Ukraine peace negotiations to counter China has not been previously reported. But many observers believe this plan has little hope of succeeding – at least while Putin and Chinese leader Xi Jinping remain in charge. And the idea of giving Russia economic incentives to grow closer to the U.S. is concerning for Ukraine, said a Ukrainian official, granted anonymity to discuss diplomatic matters. “We had such attempts in the past already and it led to nothing,” they said. “Germany had [Ostpolitik, Germany’s policy toward the East], for that and now Russia is fighting the deadliest war in Europe.” And when it comes to banking on breaking apart China and Russia, the Ukrainian official noted that both countries “have one [thing] in common which you can not beat – they hate the U.S. as a symbol of democracy.” Still, the strategy is in keeping with the administration’s broader foreign policy initiatives aimed at least in part in countering Chinese influence. Taking out Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro and pressuring Cuba’s government to the brink of collapse all diminishes China’s influence in the Western Hemisphere. The administration threatened Panama, which withdrew from Chinese leader Xi’s Belt and Road Initiative a month after Trump took office and called Peru’s deal with China surrounding its deepwater port in Chancay a “cautionary tale.” And striking Iran shifted China’s oil import potential, as Tehran supplied Beijing with more than 13 percent of its oil in 2025, according to Reuters. Indeed, the Trump administration official noted that between Venezuela, Iran and Russia, China was buying oil at below-market rates, subsidizing its consumption “to the tune of over $100 billion a year for the last several years.” “So that’s been a massive subsidy for China by being able to buy oil from these places on the black market, sometimes $30 a barrel lower than what the spot market is,” the person said. Even as there are reports that Russia is sharing intelligence with Iran, the U.S. and Russia keep talking. Witkoff and Kushner met with Kirill Dmitriev, a top adviser to Putin, last week. The Russians called the meeting “productive.” Witkoff said they’d keep talking. These negotiations and the broader efforts to counter China now take place under the spectre of Trump asking several countries, including China, for help securing the Strait of Hormuz. The National Security Strategy, released in November, spilled a fair amount of ink on China, though it often doesn’t mention Beijing directly. Many U.S. lawmakers — from both parties — consider China the gravest long-term threat to America’s global power. “There is a longstanding kind of U.S. strategic train of thought that says that having Russia and China working together is very much not in our interests, and finding ways to divide them, or at least tactically collaborate with the partner who’s less of a long term strategic threat to us,” said said Alexander Gray, Trump’s National Security Council chief of staff in his first term. Gray, who is currently the CEO of American Global Strategies, a consulting firm, compared the effort to former Secretary of State and national security adviser Henry Kissinger, who spearheaded President Richard Nixon’s trip to China during the Cold War in an effort to pull that country away from the Soviet Union. The State Department declined to comment for this report. However, a State Department spokesperson previously told POLITICO that China’s economic ties with Latin American countries present a “national security threat” for the U.S. that the administration is actively trying to mitigate. The White House declined to comment. Fred Fleitz, another Trump NSC chief of staff in his first term, noted that the president has “pressed Putin to end the war to normalize Russia’s relationship with the U.S. and Europe,” and wants Russia to rejoin the G8. “It is clear that Trump wants to find a way to end the war in Ukraine and to coexist peacefully with Russia,” said Fleitz, who now serves as the vice chair for American Security at the America First Policy Institute. “But I also believe he correctly sees the growing Russia-China alliance as a far greater threat to U.S. and global security than the Ukraine War and therefore wants to find ways to improve U.S.-Russia relations to weaken or break that alliance.” Others, however, remain skeptical. Craig Singleton, senior director of the China program at Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said the goal to break Russia and China is “appealing in theory, but in practice the partnership between Moscow and Beijing is iron-clad.” “Obviously there is nothing wrong with testing diplomacy and President Trump is a dealmaker. But history probably suggests that this won’t really result in much,” Singleton added. “The likely outcome [with Russia] is limited tactical cooperation with the U.S., not some sort of durable break with Beijing.” And China seeks to keep Russia as an ally and junior partner in its relationship as a counter to Western powers. Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi reaffirmed the relationship in a press conference this month, saying, “in a fluid and turbulent world, China-Russia relationship has stood rock-solid against all odds.” Secretary of State Marco Rubio, shortly after his confirmation, hinted at the broader strategy, saying in an interview, that “a situation where the Russians are permanently a junior partner to China, having to do whatever China says they need to do because of their dependence on them” is not a “good outcome” for Russia, the U.S. or Europe. But Rubio, like the Trump administration official given anonymity to discuss ongoing negotiations, both acknowledged that fully severing those ties would be a tough lift. “I don’t know if we’ll ever be successful at peeling them completely off a relationship with the Chinese,” Rubio said in February of last year. Adam Savit, director for China policy at the America First Policy Institute, argued that “Russia matters at the margins, but it won’t be a decisive variable in the U.S.-China competition,” and that the “center of gravity is East Asia.” “Russia gives China strategic depth, a friendly border, energy supply, and a second front in Ukraine to sap Western attention,” he said. “Getting closer to Russia could complicate China’s strategic position, but Moscow is a declining power and solidly the junior partner in that relationship.”

Dr. Daniel Steiners This is not an obituary for Germany’s economic standing. It is an invitation to shift perspective: away from the language of crisis and toward a clearer view of our opportunities — and toward the confidence that we have more capacity to shape our future than the mood indicators might suggest. For years, Germany seemed to be traveling along a self-evident path of success: growth, prosperity, the title of export champion. But that framework is beginning to fray. Other countries are catching up. Parts of our industrial base appear vulnerable to the pressures of transformation. And global dependencies are turning into strategic vulnerabilities. In short, the German model of success is under strain. Yet a glance at Europe’s economic history suggests that moments like these can also contain enormous potential — if strategic thinking and decisive action come together. One example, which I find particularly striking, takes us back to 1900. At the time, André and Édouard Michelin were producing tires in a relatively small market, when the automobile itself was still a niche product. They could have focused simply on improving their product. Instead, they thought bigger; not in silos, but in systems. With the Michelin Guide, they created incentives and orientation for greater mobility: workshop directories, road maps, and recommendations for hotels and restaurants made travel more predictable and attractive. What began as a service booklet for motorists gradually evolved into an entire ecosystem — and eventually into a globally recognized benchmark for quality. > In times of change, those who recognize connections and are willing to shape > them strategically can transform uncertainty into lasting strength. What makes this example remarkable is that the real innovation did not lie in the tire itself or merely even a clever marketing idea to boost sales. It lay in something more fundamental: connected thinking and ecosystem thinking. The decision to see mobility as a broad space for value creation. It was the courage to break out of silos, to recognize strategic connections, to deepen value chains — and to help define the standards of an emerging market. That is precisely the lesson that remains relevant today, including for policymakers. In times of change, those who recognize connections and are willing to shape them strategically can transform uncertainty into lasting strength. Germany’s industrial health economy is still too often viewed in public debate in narrowly sectoral terms — primarily through the lens of health care provision and costs. Strategically, however, it has long been an industrial ecosystem that spans research, development, manufacturing, digital innovation, exports and highly skilled employment. Just as Michelin helped shape the ecosystem of mobility, Germany can think of health as a comprehensive domain of value creation. The industrial health economy: cost driver or engine of growth? Yes, medicines cost money. In 2024, Germany’s statutory health insurance system spent around €55 billion on pharmaceuticals. But much of that increase reflects medical progress and the need for appropriate care in an aging society with changing disease patterns. Innovative therapies benefit both patients and the health system. They can improve quality and length of life while shifting treatment from hospitals into outpatient care or even into patients’ homes. They raise efficiency in the system, reduce downstream costs and support workforce participation. > In short, the industrial health economy is not merely part of our health care > system. It is a key industry, underpinning economic strength, prosperity and > the financing of our social security systems. Despite public perception, pharmaceutical spending has remained remarkably stable for years, accounting for roughly 12 percent of total expenditures in the statutory health insurance system. That figure also includes generics — medicines that enter the ‘world heritage of pharmacy’ after patent protection expires and remain available at low cost. Truly innovative, patent-protected medicines account for only about seven percent of total spending. Against these costs stands an economic sector in which Germany continues to hold a leading international position. With around 1.1 million employees and value creation exceeding €190 billion, the industrial health economy is among the largest sectors of the German economy. Its high-tech products, bearing the Made in Germany label, are in demand worldwide and contribute significantly to Germany’s export surplus. In short, the industrial health economy is not merely part of our health care system. It is a key industry, underpinning economic strength, prosperity and the financing of our social security systems. Its overall balance is positive. The central question, therefore, is this: how can we unlock its untapped potential? And what would it mean for Germany if we fail to recognize these opportunities while economic and innovative capacity increasingly shifts elsewhere? Global dynamics leave little room for hesitation Governments around the world have long recognized the strategic importance of the industrial health economy — for health care, for economic growth and for national security. China is demonstrating remarkable speed in scaling and implementing biotechnology. The United States, meanwhile, illustrates how determined industrial policy can look in practice. Regulatory authorities are being modernized, approval procedures accelerated and bureaucratic barriers systematically reduced. At the same time, domestic production is being strategically strengthened. Speed and market size act as magnets for capital — especially in a sector where research is extraordinarily capital-intensive and requires long-term planning security. When innovation-friendly conditions and economic recognition of innovation meet a large, well-funded market, global shifts follow. Today roughly 50 percent of the global pharmaceutical market is located in the United States, about 23 percent in Europe — and only 4 to 5 percent in Germany. This distribution is no coincidence; it reflects differences in economic and regulatory environments. At the same time, political pressure is growing on countries that benefit from the American innovation engine without offering an equally attractive home market or recognizing the value of innovation in comparable ways. Discussions around a Most Favored Nation approach or other trade policy instruments are moving in precisely that direction — and they affect Europe and Germany directly. For Germany, the implications are clear. Those who want to attract investment must strengthen their competitiveness. Those who want to ensure reliable health care must appropriately reward new therapies. Otherwise, these global dynamics will inevitably affect both the economy and health care at home. Already today, roughly one in four medicines introduced in the United States between 2014 and 2023 is not available in Europe. The gap is even larger for gene and cell therapies. The primacy of industrial policy: from consensus to action — now Germany does not lack potential or substance. We still have a strong industrial base, a tradition of invention, outstanding universities and research institutions, and a private sector willing to invest. Political initiatives such as the coalition agreement, the High-Tech Agenda and plans for a future strategy in pharmaceuticals and medical technology provide important impulses, which I strongly welcome. > A fair market environment without artificial price caps or rigid guardrails is > the strongest magnet for private capital, long-term investment and a resilient > health system. But programs must now translate into a coherent action plan for growth. We need innovation-friendly and stable framework conditions that consider health care, economic strength and national security together — as a strategic ecosystem, not as separate silos. The value of medical innovation must also be recognized in Germany. A fair market environment without artificial price caps or rigid guardrails is the strongest magnet for private capital, long-term investment and a resilient health system. Faster approval procedures, consistent digitalization and a determined reduction of bureaucracy are essential if speed is once again to become a competitive advantage and a driver of innovation. Germany can reinvent itself, of that I am convinced. With courage, strategic determination and an ambitious push for innovation. The choice now lies with us: to set the right course and unlock the potential that is already there.

SAN DIEGO — Ghislaine Maxwell’s lawyer on Friday acknowledged that she is continuing to seek a pardon from President Donald Trump in the wake of the release of the Epstein files. The remarks from Maxwell’s lawyer, David Oscar Markus, came during an on-stage conversation at an American Bar Association conference with Barry Pollack, the attorney for another high-profile defendant, deposed Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro. During a discussion about their media strategy in which Markus derided reporting about Maxwell’s prison transfer to what some outlets have described as a “country club”-like prison facility, Pollack suggested one goal in talking to reporters might be to alter the public perception of a defendant in hopes of leniency from the president. “I can imagine, for example, maybe you’re hoping — not in that case, but in a case — to get a presidential pardon or commutation,” Pollack said, at which point Markus interjected with a smirk to say, “that case, too.” Pollack continued: “and maybe if the public hates your client, thinks that you’ve already gotten a sweetheart deal, it may be politically more difficult for the president to do that. But maybe if you set the record straight a little bit, it’s a little easier.” Markus has publicly advocated for a pardon or clemency for Maxwell, including when she invoked her Fifth Amendment rights and declined to answer questions before the House Oversight Committee in early February. “Ms. Maxwell is prepared to speak fully and honestly if granted clemency by President Trump,” Markus said at the time. Maxwell is serving a 20-year prison sentence for her role in facilitating and participating in late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s sex-trafficking operation. The Supreme Court has declined to take up her appeal of her convictions. The attorneys also discussed hate mail they’ve received as a result of their representation of controversial clients, with Markus reading aloud an email he said he received earlier in the week from an anonymous sender with the address “Todd Blanche sucks at gmail dot com,” referring to the Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche. “Only a child predator would represent Ghislaine Maxwell,” the email read, according to Markus. “She should be on death row, rotting away and getting beaten up, and you should be there with her.” Pollack said, jokingly, that in the Maduro case, most of the commentary he receives is in Spanish, “so I don’t understand what they’re saying, I just assume that is lauding me for speaking up for the rule of law.” Federal prosecutors charged Maduro with drug trafficking and narcoterrorism conspiracy after U.S. forces seized him from Caracas in January. Markus also asked Pollack about a roadblock in the Maduro case regarding licenses that would allow Maduro and the government of Venezuela to sidestep sanctions in order to pay Pollack for his legal representation. In court filings, Pollack has said the Trump administration’s Office of Foreign Assets Control suddenly — and without explanation — revoked licenses it had issued to allow Venezuela to pay Maduro’s lawyers, leaving him unable to afford representation. As a result, Pollack has asked a federal judge to dismiss the Maduro indictment. “There have been some bumps along the road towards getting that license,” Pollack said. “So representatives of OFAC if you’re out there, please put in your work.”

BRITAIN’S LABOUR PARTY STARES INTO THE ABYSS IN ITS WELSH HEARTLAND In the old coalfields of south Wales, Britain’s center-left establishment faces being crushed by a nationalist left and populist right. POLITICO went to find out why. By DAN BLOOM and SASCHA O’SULLIVAN in Newport, South Wales Photo-Illustration by Natália Delgado/POLITICO Eluned Morgan, the Welsh first minister, stood in a sunbeam at Newport’s Victorian market and declared: “Wales is ready for a new chapter.” Many voters agree. The problem for Morgan is: few think she’ll be the one to write it. This nation of 3 million people, with its coalfields, docks, mountains and farms, is the deepest heartland of Morgan’s center-left Labour Party. Labour has topped every U.K. general election here for 104 years and presided over the Welsh parliament, the Senedd, since establishing it 27 years ago. Yet Senedd elections on May 7 threaten not only to end this world-record winning streak, but leave Welsh Labour fighting for a reason to exist. One YouGov poll in January put the party joint-fourth with the Conservatives on 10 percent, behind Welsh nationalists Plaid Cymru on 37 percent, Nigel Farage’s populist Reform UK on 23 percent and the Greens on 13 percent. Other polls are less dramatic (one last week had Reform and Plaid equal, and Labour a closer third), but the mood remains stark.  The most common projection for the 96-seat Senedd is a Plaid minority government propped up by Labour — blowing a hole in Labour’s status as the default governing party and safe vote to stop the right, and echoing recent by-elections in Caerphilly (won by Plaid) and Manchester (won by Greens). POLITICO visited south Wales and spoke to 30 politicians and officials across Labour, Plaid and Reform. | Dan Bloom/POLITICO It would raise the simple question, said a senior Welsh Labour official granted anonymity to speak frankly: “What is the point in this party?’” POLITICO visited south Wales and spoke to 30 politicians and officials across Labour, Plaid and Reform, including interviews with all three of their Welsh leaders, for this piece and an episode of the Westminster Insider podcast. The conversations painted a vivid picture of a center-left establishment fighting for survival in an election that could echo far beyond Wales. While in the 1980s Welsh Labour could unite voters against Margaret Thatcher’s Conservatives, now it is battling demographic changes, a decline in unionized heavy industry and an anti-incumbent backlash. All have killed old loyalties and habits. Squeezed by Plaid and Greens to their left and Reform to their right, some in Labour see parallels with other mainstream postwar parties facing a reckoning across Europe. This week, Germany’s conservative Christian Democrats and center-left Social Democrats lost to the Greens in the car production region of Baden-Württemberg; the latter barely scraped 5 percent. In the recent Manchester by-election, the Conservatives lost their deposit. Welsh Labour MPs fear a reckoning. One said: “We will have to start again. We rebuild. We figure out, what does Welsh Labour mean in 2026? What do we stand for?” NEW CHAPTER, SAME AUTHOR It takes Morgan 20 minutes to walk the 500 meters from Newport Market to our interview. Some passers-by flag her down; others she ambushes. We pass a baked goods shop (“Ooh, Gregg’s! That’s what I want!”) and Morgan emerges with a latte, though not with one of the chain’s famous sausage rolls. She introduces herself to one woman as “Eluned Morgan, first minister of Wales.” Her target looks vaguely bemused.  After the Covid pandemic, people are simply more aware of what the Welsh government actually does — which means Labour, as the incumbent, gets more blame when things go wrong. | Matthew Horwood/Getty Images A peer and ex-MEP who joined the Senedd in 2016, Morgan is a fixture of Wales’ Labour establishment who became first minister unopposed in August 2024 after her predecessor, Vaughan Gething, resigned over a donations scandal. “I didn’t have a mandate really, because I was just kind of thrown in,” she tells POLITICO midway up the high street. “I thought, right, I need a program, so I went out on the streets and took my program directly from the public without any filter.”  She is selling a nuts-and-bolts offer of new railway stations, a £2 bus fare cap and same-day mental health care. Morgan casts herself as the experienced option to beat what she calls the “separatists” of Plaid and the “concerning” rise of populism. She means Reform, which wants to scrap net zero targets and cut 580 Welsh civil service jobs. Yet paradoxically, she also paints herself as a vessel for change. “[People] want to see change faster,” she said in John Frost Square, named after the leader of an 1839 uprising that demanded voting rights for all men. She wants to show “delivery” and “hope.” Dimitri Batrouni, Newport Council’s Labour leader, suggested an Amazonification of politics is under way. “Our lives commercially are instant,” he said. “I want something, I order it, it’s delivered to my house … people quite naturally want that in their governments.” But after 27 years, many voters are rolling the dice on delivery elsewhere. Welsh Labour is promising to end homelessness by 2034, but previously made the same pledge by 2026. Around 6,900 people are still waiting two years or more for NHS treatment (though this figure was 10 times higher during the Covid-19 pandemic). Education rankings slumped in 2023. At Newport’s Friars Walk shopping center, retired mechanical engineer Roy Wigmore, 81, said all politicians are liars. “I’ve voted Labour all my life until now,” he said, “but I’ll probably vote for somebody else — probably Nigel Farage.” ‘SHIT, WELL, HE DIDN’T CALL ME’ Much of this anger is pointed at Westminster — which is why Labour has long tried to show a more socialist face to Wales.  It was the seat of Labour co-founder Keir Hardie as well as of Nye Bevan, who launched Britain’s National Health Service in 1948. “Welsh Labour” was born out of the first Senedd-style elections in 1999, when Plaid surged in south Wales heartlands while Tony Blair’s New Labour appealed to the middle classes. For years, this deliberate rebranding worked; Labour pulled through with the most seats even when the Tories ruled Westminster. Yet in 2024, the party boasted of “two Labour governments at both ends of the M4” — in London and in Cardiff — working in harmony. The emphasis soon flipped back when things went wrong in No. 10; Morgan promised a “red Welsh way” last May. She is “trying to find our identity again,” said the MP quoted above. Morgan appeared to disown the “both ends of the M4” approach, while declining to call it a mistake. “Look, that was a decision before I became first minister,” she said. A peer and ex-MEP who joined the Senedd in 2016, Morgan is a fixture of Wales’ Labour establishment who became first minister unopposed in August 2024 after her predecessor, Vaughan Gething, resigned over a donations scandal. | Matthew Horwood/Getty Images She tries to be playful in distancing herself from Keir Starmer. “He came down a couple of weeks ago and I was very clear with him, if you’re coming you need to bring something with you. Fair play, he brought £14 billion of investment,” she said. “If he wants to come again, he’ll have to bring me more money.” But she has also hitched herself to Starmer for now — unlike Scottish Labour leader Anas Sarwar, who has called for the PM to go. As we sat down, Morgan professed surprise at news that Sarwar called several Cabinet ministers beforehand. “Did he! Shit, well, he didn’t call me,” she said. “Look at the state of the world at the moment; actually what we need is stability,” she added. “We need the grown-ups in the room to be in charge, and I do think Keir Starmer is a grown-up.” ‘ELUNED WASN’T HAPPY’ Morgan has mounted a fightback since Plaid won October’s Caerphilly by-election.  She has hired Matt Greenough, a strategist who worked on London Mayor Sadiq Khan’s re-election campaign last year, said three people with knowledge of the appointment. One of the people said: “During Caerphilly, it became quite clear there were a lot of problems. Eluned wasn’t happy with Welsh Labour or the way the campaign was running. She did a lot of lobbying and got the Welsh executive to basically give her complete power over the campaign.” Morgan “was angry that the central party [in London] took control of the Caerphilly by-election,” another of the people added. (A Morgan ally disputed this reading of events, saying she would always take a bigger role as the election drew near, and that a wide range of Labour figures are involved in the campaign committee such as a Westminster MP, Torsten Bell.) Morgan also has more support these days from Labour’s MPs — who pushed last year for her to focus less on Plaid and more on Reform. That lobbying may have been a mistake, the MP quoted above admits now. “We were quite naive in thinking that the progressives would back us,” this MP said. Privately, Labour politicians and officials in Wales say the mood and prospects are better than the start of 2026. Though asked if Labour would win the most seats in the Senedd, Batrouni said: “Let’s look and see. It’s not looking good in the polls but … politics changes so quickly.” IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT KEIR STARMER The harsh reality is that Labour’s base in Wales began slipping long before Starmer, rooted in deindustrialization since the 1970s and 80s. Newport, near England on the M4 corridor, has a measure of prosperity that other parts of Wales do not. The 137-year-old market has had a makeover, Microsoft is building data centers and U.S. giant Vishay runs Britain’s biggest semiconductor plant. Here Labour is mostly expecting a fight between itself and Reform. At Newport’s Friars Walk shopping center, retired mechanical engineer Roy Wigmore, 81, said all politicians are liars. “I’ve voted Labour all my life until now,” he said, “but I’ll probably vote for somebody else — probably Nigel Farage.” | Jon Rowley/Getty Images Wales’ west coast and north west are more Plaid-dominated, with more Welsh speakers and independence supporters. But support for nationalists is spreading in the southern valleys. “All across the valleys you’re seeing places where Labour has dominated for 100 years plus but is now in deep, deep crisis,” said Richard Wyn Jones, professor of Welsh politics at Cardiff University. “It has long been the case that a lot of Labour supporters have had a very positive view of Plaid Cymru — they just didn’t have a reason to vote for them until now.” Wyn Jones attributes the change to trends across northern Europe, where traditional left-wing parties have been “unmoored” from working-class occupations. A growing service sector has brought more white-collar voters with socially liberal values. Carmen Smith, a 29-year-old Plaid campaigner who is the House of Lords’ youngest-ever peer, said Brexit had unhitched young, left-leaning voters from the idea of British patriotism: “There are a lot more young people identifying as Welsh rather than British.”  And after the Covid pandemic, people are simply more aware of what the Welsh government actually does — which means Labour, as the incumbent, gets more blame when things go wrong.  All the while, a left-behind contingent of socially conservative ex-Labour voters is turning to Reform UK. At the Tumble Inn, a Wetherspoons chain pub in the valley town of Pontypridd, retired gas engineer Paul Jones remembered: “You could leave one job, walk a couple of hundred yards and start another job … it was a totally different world. I wish we could get it back, but I don’t think it’s going to happen.” He hasn’t voted for years but plans to back Reform. THEY’VE BLOWN UP THE MAP All these changes will be turbocharged by a new electoral map. A previous Labour first minister, Mark Drakeford, introduced a more proportional voting system which will see voters elect six Senedd members in each of 16 super-constituencies. The results will reflect the mood better than U.K. general elections (Labour won 84 percent of Wales’ seats on a 37 percent vote share in 2024), but create a volatile outcome. In the mega-constituency for eastern Cardiff, Wyn Jones believes the six seats could be won by six parties: Labour, Plaid, Reform, the Conservatives, Greens and Liberal Democrats. Ironically, said the Labour MP quoted above, Welsh Labour is now polling so badly that it could actually win more seats under the new system than the old one. Trying to win the sixth seat in each super-constituency will hoover up many resources. The size of each patch changes how parties campaign, said Plaid’s Westminster leader Liz Savile Roberts: “We’ve had to go to places that I’ve never been to.” And the scale means activists have a weaker connection to the candidates they campaign for — compounded in Labour by many Senedd members stepping down. Just six people turned up to one recent Labour door-knocking session in a heartland seat. A left-behind contingent of socially conservative ex-Labour voters is turning to Reform UK. | Huw Fairclough/Getty Images After May 8, the new system will make coalitions or informal support deals more necessary to command a Senedd majority. Morgan declined to say if she would support Plaid’s £400 million-a-year offer to expand free childcare (which Labour says is unfunded), rather than see it voted down. “I’m certainly not getting into hypotheticals,” she said. “I’m in this to win it.”  Her rivals have other ideas. THE PRESIDENT IS COMING On the hill above Newport, a two-story presidential-style image of Rhun ap Iorwerth filled a screen at the International Convention Centre above the words: “New leadership for Wales.” The former BBC presenter, who took over Plaid’s leadership in 2023, strained not to make his February conference look like a premature victory lap. Members could’ve been fooled. They struggled to find parking. There were more lobbyists; more journalists. It is a slow burn for a party founded in 1925, which won its first Westminster seat in 1966. Ap Iorwerth ramped up the anti-establishment rhetoric in his conference speech while Lindsay Whittle, who won Caerphilly for Plaid in October’s by-election, bellowed: “Rich men from London, we are waiting for you!” Yet he insists his success is more than a protest vote, a trend sweeping Europe or a mirror of Reform’s populism. “I’d like to think that we’re doing something different,” Ap Iorwerth told POLITICO. While Morgan accuses him of “separatism,” he said: “We have a growing sense of Welsh nationhood and Welsh identity, at a time when there’s deep disillusionment in the old guard of U.K. politics and a sense of needing to keep at bay that populist right wing.” Ap Iorwerth said there is a “very real danger” that Labour vanishes entirely as a serious force in the Senedd. “The level of support that they have collapsed to is a level that most people, probably myself included, could never have imagined would happen so quickly,” he said. INDEPENDENCE DAY? But Plaid faces three big challenges to hold this pole position. The first is its ground game, stretched thin to cover the new world of mega-seats. On the hill above Newport, a two-story presidential-style image of Rhun ap Iorwerth filled a screen at the International Convention Centre above the words: “New leadership for Wales.” | Matthew Horwood/Getty Images The second is to remain distinct from Labour and the insurgent Greens while running a broad left-leaning platform focused on energy costs, childcare and the NHS. The third is to convince unionist voters that Plaid is not simply a Trojan horse for Welsh independence. Independence is Plaid’s core belief, yet Ap Iorwerth did not mention the word once in his speech, instead promising a “standing commission” to look at Wales’ future. He told POLITICO he would rather have a “sustained, engaging, deep discussion … than try to crash, bang, wallop, towards the line.”  But opponents suggest Plaid will push hard for independence if they win a second term in 2030 — like the Scottish National Party did after topping elections in 2007 then 2011. One conference attendee, Emyr Gruffydd, 36, a member for 19 years, said independence “is going to be part of our agenda in the future, definitely. But I think nation-building has to be the approach that we take in the first term.” Savile Roberts accepted that shelving talk of independence (which is still supported by less than half the Welsh population) is part of a deliberate strategy to broaden the party’s reach and keep a wide left-leaning appeal. “I mean, we know the people that we need to appeal to — it is the disenchanted Labour voters,” she said. For some shoppers in Newport — not Plaid’s home turf — it may be working. One ex-Labour voter, Rose Halford, said of Plaid: “All they want to do is make everybody speak Welsh.” But she’ll consider backing them: “They’re showing a bit more gumption, aren’t they?” TAXING QUESTIONS FOR PLAID If Plaid does win, that’s when the hard part begins. Ap Iorwerth would seek urgent talks about changing Wales’ funding formula from Westminster — but cannot say how much this would raise. And Plaid has vowed not to hike income tax, one of the few (blunt) tax instruments available to the Welsh government. Strategists looked at the issue before and feared it would prompt taxpayers to flee over the border to England. So Plaid promises vague financial “efficiencies” in areas such as child poverty, where spending exceeded £7 billion since 2022, and health. Whittle said: “There’s an awful lot of people pen-pushing in the health service. We don’t need pen-pushers.” Labour’s attack machine argues that Plaid and Reform UK alike would cut services. Ap Iorwerth insists his and Farage’s promises are different: “We’re talking about being effective and efficient.” But he admitted: “You don’t know the detail until you come into government.”  Ap Iorwerth jettisoned any suggestion that Plaid would introduce universal basic income, saying it is “not a pledge for government.” He added: “It’s something that I believe in as a principle. I don’t think we’re in a place where we have anything like a model that could be put in place now.” Ap Iorwerth would seek urgent talks about changing Wales’ funding formula from Westminster — but cannot say how much this would raise. | Matthew Horwood/Getty Images The blame game between Cardiff and Westminster will run hot. Ap Iorwerth voiced outrage this week at a leaked memo from Starmer in December, ordering his Cabinet to deliver directly in Wales and Scotland “even when devolved governments may oppose this.” FARAGE’S WELSH SURGE And then there’s Reform. Farage’s party has rocketed in the polls since 2024; typical branch meetings have swelled from a dozen members to several dozen. Since February, Reform has even had its own leader for Wales — Dan Thomas, a former Tory councillor in London who says he recently moved back to the area of Blackwood, in the south Wales valleys. Some party figures have observed a dip after the Caerphilly by-election, where Reform came second. Thomas insists: “I don’t think we’ve plateaued” — and even said there is room to increase a 31 percent vote share from one (optimistic) poll. “There’s still a Labour vote to squeeze,” he told POLITICO.  “We’re targeting all of Wales.” It is a measure of Plaid’s success that Reform UK often now presents the nationalist party as its main competition. “It’s a two-horse race [with Plaid], that’s what I say on the doors,” said Leanne Dyke, a Reform canvasser who was drinking in the Pontypridd Wetherspoons. James Evans, who is now one of Reform’s two Senedd members after he was thrown out of the Conservative group in January on suspicion of defection talks, argues his supporters are underrepresented in polling because they are “smeared” as bigots. Evans added: “Very similarly to what happened in America when Donald Trump was elected, I think there is a quiet majority of people out there who do not want to say they’re voting Reform, who will vote Reform.”  Reform has its own custom-built member app, ReformGo, as it canvasses data on where its supporters live for the first time. It sent a mass appeal by post to all registered Welsh voters in late 2025 (before spending limits kicked in). Welsh campaign director David Thomas is recruiting a brand new slate of 96 candidates, booking hotels for training days with interviews, written exercises and team-building. Daytime TV presenter Jeremy Kyle has helped with media training. English officials cross the border to help; Reform still only has three paid officials in Wales. FARAGE HAS AN NHS PROBLEM Lian Walker, a postal worker from the village of Pen-y-graig, would be a prime target for Reform. “There’s people who I see on the databases, they don’t work,” she said in Pontpridd’s Patriot pub, “but they get everything; new windows, earrings, T-shirts, shorts.” She supports Reform’s plans to deport migrants. But on the NHS, she says of Reform: “They want it to go private like America.” Labour and Plaid drive this attack line relentlessly. The full picture is more nuanced — but still exposes a tension between Farage and Thomas. But Farage has an advantage; the right is less split than the left. | Ben Birchall/PA Images via Getty Images While Reform emphasizes it would keep the NHS free at the point of use, Farage has not ruled out shifting its funding from general taxation to a French-style insurance model, saying that would be “a national decision ahead of a general election.” Thomas, however, broke from this stance. He told POLITICO: “No, no. We rule out any kind of insurance system or any kind of privatization.” He added: “Nigel’s also said that devolved issues are down to the Welsh party, and I wouldn’t consider any kind of insurance-based or private-based system for the Welsh NHS.” Labour and Plaid are relying on an anti-Reform vote to keep Farage’s party out of power. Opponents have also highlighted the jailing of Nathan Gill, Reform’s former Welsh leader, for taking bribes to give pro-Russia interviews and speeches. But Farage has an advantage; the right is less split than the left. In Evans’ sprawling rural seat of Brecon and Radnorshire, two people with knowledge of the Conservative association said its membership had fallen catastrophically from a recent peak of around 400. On the other hand, the sheer number of defections makes Reform look more like a copycat Conservative Party. A former Tory staffer works for Evans; Thomas’ press officer is the Welsh Conservatives’ former media chief. Evans said last year that 99 percent of Reform’s policies were “populist rubbish,” but was allowed to see the policy platform in secret before he agreed to join (and has since contributed to it). While the long-time former UKIP and Brexit Party politician Mark Reckless led a policy consultation in the first half of 2025, former Conservative Welsh Secretary David Jones — who defected without fanfare last year — played a hands-on role behind the scenes working up manifesto policies, two people with knowledge of his work said. THE NIGEL SHOW Then there is Reform’s reliance on Farage himself.  The party deliberately left it late before unveiling a Welsh leader, said a Reform figure in Wales, and chose in Thomas a Welsh figure who would not “detract from Nigel’s overall umbrella and brand.” While Welsh officials and politicians worked on the manifesto, Farage himself was involved in signing it off — as were several others in London, said Evans, including frontbench spokespeople Robert Jenrick, Suella Braverman and Zia Yusuf. Thomas said: “Ultimately, it’s my decision to sign off the manifesto. Of course, Nigel was consulted because he’s our U.K. leader, and we want to ensure that what’s going on in Wales is aligned to the broader picture in the UK.” Reform’s Welsh manifesto promises to cut a penny off every band of income tax by 2030, end Wales’ “nation of sanctuary” plan to support asylum seekers, scrap 20mph road speed limits and upgrade the M4 and A55 highways. But costings have not been published yet — Reform has sent them to be assessed by the Institute for Fiscal studies, a nonpartisan think tank — and like other parties, Reform faces questions about how it will all be paid for. Asked if Reform would begin work on the M4 and A55 upgrades by 2030, Thomas replied: “We’d like to. But we all know in this country, infrastructure projects take a long time.” While Welsh officials and politicians worked on the manifesto, Farage himself was involved in signing it off — as were several others in London, said Evans, including frontbench spokespeople Robert Jenrick, Suella Braverman and Zia Yusuf. | Huw Fairclough/Getty Images ‘I’VE GOT TO FOCUS ON WHAT I CAN CONTROL’ These harsh realities facing Wales’ would-be rulers are a silver lining for Labour. Morgan avoided POLITICO’s question about whether she believes the polls — “I’ve got to focus on what I can control” — but insisted many voters remain persuadable. “People will scratch the surface and say [our rivals] are not ready,” she said. Alun Michael, who led the first Welsh Labour administration in 1999, said the idea that the Labour vote has “collapsed completely” is wrong. “It’s always dangerous to go on opinion polls as a decider of what will happen in an election,” he said. Whoever does win will deserve a moment of levity. If Ap Iorwerth wins the most seats on May 7, he will drink an Aperol spritz; Thomas will have a glass of Penderyn Welsh whisky.  As for Morgan? She would like a cup of tea — milk, no sugar. Perhaps survival would be sweet enough.

PARIS — Emmanuel Grégoire should have had an easy campaign to succeed his former boss, Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo. But the pair’s very public political breakup is creating a major obstacle for the Socialist front-runner in the lead-up to the race to lead the French capital, which begins on Sunday. Since their clash, Grégoire has conspicuously distanced himself from Hidalgo, and that has meant losing the opportunity to win votes by boasting about the successful Paris Olympics or the transformation of the banks of the Seine into a popular pedestrian area with cafés and restaurants.   If Grégoire fails to extend the Socialists’ quarter-century rule of Paris, it would be a disaster for his party and further evidence of its weakness before the country’s presidential election next year. “She did everything she could to torpedo my candidacy. I’m not her candidate and I am not her heir,” Grégoire said in a February interview with franceinfo. That’s a spectacular rupture for the man who was her principal deputy from 2018 to 2024. The race is going to be close, giving the right its best opportunity in years to take control of the City of Lights — if it can unite around one candidate. Grégoire and conservative former Culture Minister Rachida Dati are running neck-and-neck for the top spot in the polls. But an unprecedented five candidates could make the runoff on March 22, which would trigger a mad scramble for alliances.  PARIS LOCAL ELECTION POLL OF POLLS All 3 Years 2 Years 1 Year 6 Months Smooth Kalman For more polling data from across Europe visit POLITICO Poll of Polls. A BUNGLED SUCCESSION So what happened between Hidalgo, the chief architect of the French capital’s green revolution, and Grégoire, her once-presumed heir?    Over the summer, Hidalgo spurned his candidacy to support a lesser-known senator to succeed her as mayor.  Grégoire still wound up winning the Socialist Party’s nomination, but the damage was done after Hidalgo publicly claimed that “the left would lose” Paris if her former deputy was its candidate.  Three people familiar with their relationship, all granted anonymity to speak candidly, said things started to turn sour after Hidalgo’s failed 2022 presidential bid, in which she won a dismal 1.75 percent of the vote.  With Hidalgo’s fortunes waning and Grégoire seemingly tapped as her replacement, things started to get “complicated,” an official in the Socialist Party said.   The pace of change and Anne Hidalgo’s disregard for her critics has not helped her popularity. | Ludovic Marin/AFP via Getty Images “She has an authoritarian streak and was really hard on him,” the official said.  This is a trait that has widely been remarked upon, and it earned her the nickname “Queen-Mayor.” It helped with short-term implementation of projects but now looks like it could have undermined her party in the long run, given some of the bad blood it has fomented.   “You need toughness to succeed in Paris and transform the city,” said Gaspard Gantzer, a former Paris City Hall advisor. “Her style was a bit brutal, a bit cutting with others.”  Hidalgo was then furious when Grégoire ran for and won a parliamentary seat representing Paris during the 2024 election, according to two of the three people familiar with the relationship. One of Hidalgo’s allies said “they were both at fault,” as Grégoire became less supportive of her political ambitions and started pursuing his own agenda after the last presidential race.  “It was a classic leader versus heir situation,” the Hidalgo supporter said.   ‘A DIFFERENT MAYOR’ Asked about the feud by POLITICO when unveiling his platform to reporters last month, Grégoire said he has fond memories of working with Hidalgo but stressed he would be “a different mayor” who would address “the new expectations” of Paris residents.  Grégoire has instead tried to take a page out of Zoran Mamdani’s New York playbook, focusing his message on housing shortages and bringing down the cost of living. He’s also promised to “break with [Hidalgo’s] method.”  While Grégoire hasn’t exactly broken through in the polls, the strategy could reap benefits given the Europe-wide anti-green backlash and Hidalgo’s reputation among resident of the capital.  A poll from Ipsos published in December found that Hidalgo leaves office with a legacy that splits Parisians, even if they have come to love biking to work or enjoying more open space.   The pace of change and Hidalgo’s disregard for her critics has made her divisive, even losing some support among those proud of the Olympics and Paris becoming a global showcase for urban transformation. Hidalgo’s missteps added to the resentment, whether that focused on ill-designed bike lanes, several abandoned urban forests or the endless redevelopment of the Eiffel Tower gardens.  “She would make a huge announcement and then wait for her teams to comply,” said Paris urban policy expert Stephane Kirkland, who has worked for firms involved in Paris city projects. “It was a my-way-or-the-highway approach.” Rachida Dati has tried to seize on public dissatisfaction with City Hall by linking Grégoire to Hidalgo. | Ludovic Marin/AFP via Getty Images Kirkland said that Grégoire’s campaign has clearly “internalized the new dynamic” against green issues and exasperation with Hidalgo.  Grégoire “isn’t talking about anything green, even if his coalition includes green parties. He is really focused on social issues, security and cleanliness,” Kirkland said.  Dati, the conservative challenger, has tried to seize on public dissatisfaction with City Hall by linking Grégoire to Hidalgo and accusing the duo of turning Paris into a dirty, disorganized, never-ending construction site.  There are limits to that strategy, though. Not even Dati wants to reverse course on pedestrian zones like those on the banks of the Seine.   Aitor Hernández-Morales contributed to this report. 

LONDON — Keir Starmer is so often portrayed as a process-obsessed lawyer that a colleague once called him “Mr. Rules.” But Wednesday’s documents release about the prime minister’s appointment of Peter Mandelson — a friend of the late convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein — to be Britain’s ambassador to Washington provides more evidence of the raw politics that greased the wheels of Downing Street. There is no “smoking gun” that showed Starmer knew everything about the Mandelson-Epstein relationship. That’s because he didn’t, and one was never expected. The question from the PM’s critics has always been whether he should have taken a different course, given what he did know. That means the most difficult revelation for Starmer is that a top Foreign Office official and his most senior foreign policy aide, national security adviser Jonathan Powell, both had concerns about the appointment — even as the PM’s chief of staff, Morgan McSweeney, pushed to get it over the line. In other words: The process was there, but the final call was political — and rested on the PM’s personal judgement. ‘REPUTATIONAL RISK’ Starmer decided to sack Mandelson last September after new revelations about his close historic friendship with Epstein. Mandelson has apologized “unequivocally” for his association with Epstein and “to the women and girls that suffered.” The prime minister said at that time — and often repeats now — that the “depth and extent” of the relationship clearly went further than he had known when he appointed Mandelson. This is true, but the new files show red flags were there nonetheless.  The 147-page cache published by the U.K. government shows Starmer was warned that Mandelson’s friendship with Epstein was a “reputational risk.” A note to the prime minister from Dec. 11, 2024 provides the receipts for what Starmer recently admitted — that he was warned about reports that Mandelson had stayed in Epstein’s home after his 2008 conviction for soliciting prostitution from a minor. Aides also flagged to Starmer the fact — which was not public at the time — that Mandelson brokered a meeting between his friend Epstein and former PM Tony Blair in 2002 to talk about “economic and monetary trends.” Separately, Starmer’s national security adviser Powell raised concerns, albeit they only appear in the files after Mandelson’s sacking. The 147-page cache published by the U.K. government shows Starmer was warned that Mandelson’s friendship with Epstein was a “reputational risk.” | Lucy North/PA Images via Getty Images Powell’s misgivings are revealed in notes of a “fact-finding” call between Powell and the PM’s General Counsel Mike Ostheimer, the evening after Starmer sacked Mandelson last September. The notes show Powell — who had worked for years with Mandelson in Tony Blair’s Downing Street — raised concerns about Mandelson’s reputation directly with McSweeney.  Powell told Ostheimer he had found the process “unusual” and “weirdly rushed” — and that the most senior civil servant in the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office, Philip Barton, also “had reservations around the appointment.” But Mandelson got the job anyway, and arrangements were made in haste ahead of Donald Trump’s January 2025 inauguration as U.S. president. Mandelson was handed his IT equipment and first set of “official sensitive” level files on Boxing Day. Two previous shortlists in 2024 — one compiled by Starmer’s predecessor as PM Rishi Sunak, and a second by McSweeney’s predecessor as chief of staff Sue Gray — had been torn up before Mandelson strode forward. Starmer made his decision less than a week after receiving the due diligence report. ‘MORGAN’S FINGERPRINTS ARE ALL OVER THIS’ Wednesday’s document dump shows the political relationships that lay behind this process. Two names crop up repeatedly in the files; those of McSweeney and Starmer’s then-Director of Communications Matthew Doyle, who were both political special advisers in No. 10 and personal friends of Mandelson. The documents show that McSweeney and Mandelson spoke to each other repeatedly. At one point on Dec. 20, 2024, shortly after Starmer approved the appointment, it was McSweeney who contacted Mandelson personally to flag the need for him to fill out conflict of interest forms.  When the Epstein friendship was flagged in due diligence, McSweeney had a “back and forth” with Doyle, the former communications chief told Ostheimer in a separate fact-finding call. This back-and-forth resulted in McSweeney asking Mandelson three questions about his links with Epstein.  After this, Doyle was “satisfied” with Mandelson’s responses about his contact with Epstein, according to the note to Starmer on Dec. 11, 2024. Doyle, whom Starmer elevated to the House of Lords, had the Labour whip suspended in February after it emerged he had campaigned for a friend who had been convicted of child sex offenses. (Doyle has previously apologized for this “clear error of judgment.”) The government has yet to publish extensive WhatsApp and email communications between Mandelson and Starmer’s ministers and aides. | Richard Baker / In Pictures via Getty Images One senior Labour MP, who was granted anonymity to speak frankly, said: “Matthew Doyle’s understanding of what is appropriate contact with a pedophile is somewhat questionable.”  Crucially, Mandelson’s answers to McSweeney’s three questions have not yet been published. The email chain has been held back at the request of the Metropolitan Police, which is midway through a separate investigation into Mandelson. When this email chain is eventually published, No. 10 aides believe it will support Starmer’s case that Mandelson “lied” to Downing Street about his relationship with Epstein. Mandelson’s lawyers did not respond to a request for comment after the documents were released Wednesday. AN OUTRAGEOUS FORTUNE There are other elements of the new files that will reassure Starmer’s restive MPs. The most obvious is that McSweeney and Doyle have both already left No. 10. The senior Labour MP quoted above said: “It’s a good thing Morgan’s gone because his fingerprints are all over this. How could he possibly have stayed?” A second Labour MP said it was a relief that McSweeney had left. “He was working against the prime minister’s best interests,” they said. The other factor cheering Labour MPs is what the files say about Mandelson in his own words, fueling his new-found status as a Labour hate figure. The files show Mandelson asked for a £547,201 severance payment after his sacking (he got £75,000), and told the FCDO’s Chief People Officer Mark Power in September that his “chief concern” was arriving back with “maximum dignity and minimum media intrusion.” “[Labour MPs] are more preoccupied with the £500,000,” said a third Labour MP loyal to Starmer. “What kind of person asks for that?” But this is only one step on the road for Starmer’s No. 10, and for possible questions about the prime minister’s judgement. The government has yet to publish extensive WhatsApp and email communications between Mandelson and Starmer’s ministers and aides, not just about his appointment and dismissal but about broader politics, relationships and strategy. Downing Street also announced on Wednesday that it will review the separate national security vetting system. | Paul Ellis/AFP via Getty Images Wednesday’s files show the concern that the breadth of this planned publication — forced in a vote by the opposition Conservative Party — sparked in No. 10. As Starmer prepared to agree to the transparency earlier this year, his private secretary for foreign affairs, Ailsa Terry, told a fellow official there should be a “welfare check” on Mandelson every day. Downing Street also announced on Wednesday that it will review the separate national security vetting system — details of which have not been published in Mandelson’s case — to learn lessons from the former ambassador’s developed vetting. ALL FOR WHAT? The great irony is that Starmer might have avoided all this pain by listening to officialdom. Wednesday’s document release confirmed that two unnamed government officials were found “appointable” for the ambassador job following a recruitment process in April 2024, under Starmer’s predecessor Sunak. Two people with knowledge of the process told POLITICO that the lead candidate was the then-No. 10 national security adviser Tim Barrow, as widely reported at the time. And the runner-up? Christian Turner, the two people said. It is Turner to whom Starmer has now turned for a steadier pair of hands in Washington. Critics might wonder why he didn’t appoint him in the first place. Mason Boycott-Owen contributed to this report.

LE HAVRE, France — Former Prime Minister Édouard Philippe is often seen as the centrist candidate best placed to challenge the far right in France’s presidential election next year — but his political future is under threat in the gritty industrial port of Le Havre. Philippe, one of President Emmanuel Macron’s most popular former lieutenants, has been mayor of this city in Normandy since 2020, but polling suggests he now faces a make-or-break battle not to lose it to a Communist rival in the municipal elections of March 15 and 22. If he does lose his northern stronghold — which he also ran from 2010 to 2017 — Philippe’s loss will send shockwaves through France. The center-right politician has said that will mean he won’t run in the 2027 election against the candidate from the far-right National Rally (RN) party — either Marine Le Pen or Jordan Bardella, the current frontrunners for the presidency. It will also be a grave personal disappointment for Philippe, who has long held ambitions to run for the Élysée. As prime minister from 2017 to 2020 he steered France through the Covid pandemic, but was ultimately sidelined by Macron when the president wanted to give his government a “new direction,” a decision that many in the administration believed was due to Philippe’s higher popularity ratings. This month’s local elections are an opportunity to launch his campaign ahead of the 2027 presidential race. But Philippe now risks slipping up before he even reaches the starting line. A shock poll from OpinionWay landed last month and predicted that Philippe could be squeezed out by the far right and far left in the second round of the contest in Le Havre. Philippe was seen winning only 40 percent, pipped by the Communist Jean-Paul Lecoq on 42 percent. Franck Keller, backed by the RN, was set to win 18 percent. The center-right politician has said that will mean he won’t run in the 2027 election against the candidate from the far-right National Rally (RN) party — either Marine Le Pen or Jordan Bardella. | Adnan Farzat/NurPhoto via Getty Images On Friday, POLITICO caught up with 55-year-old Philippe on the campaign train. He was dashing between events but still keen to grab a beer, drop the formalities and chat with voters — in true retail politician style. “Elections are always tight here,” he said in an interview with POLITICO between two campaign stops on Friday. “Le Havre is a working-class city where the Communist Party is very rooted and very strong.” While the Communist Party is no longer the national force it used to be, many of the issues close to the hearts of its voters are the same as those driving the National Rally vote in other parts of the country. Here in Le Havre, blue-collar voters stress job protection, early retirement and a strong welfare state. In the 2027 presidential race, Philippe would have to convince voters, disaffected after a decade under Macron, that his brand of center-right politics is what France needs. A SHAKY STRONGHOLD The man who might bring Philippe down is hardly a political big gun. Jean-Paul Lecoq is a 67-year-old electrician who spent much of his life repairing typewriters in Le Havre. Unlike Philippe, who was educated in France’s elite schools, Lecoq had a long career in local politics before becoming a member of parliament in 2017. Here in Le Havre, blue-collar voters stress job protection, early retirement and a strong welfare state. | Lou Benoist/AFP via Getty Images Lecoq’s team has been buoyed by the OpinionWay poll — the only one available on Le Havre — which showed Philippe leading in the first round with 37 percent, but Lecoq winning the runoff. In a market in the Sanvic neighbourhood of Le Havre, Lecoq lampooned Philippe for using the local election as a stepping stone for his presidential ambitions. “He wanted to link the local and the presidential election,” he said. “With Philippe, it’s me, me, me. I know best.” Le Havre’s incumbent mayor “has done some beautiful brand-new projects in Le Havre, turned it into a showcase. But he hasn’t taken care of the city property … the schools, the sports clubs,” Lecoq said. The idea he has one eye on the Élysée is getting some traction with voters. “If he’s elected, and then launches into a presidential campaign, who is going take over here?” asked Cédric Perisbeau, a former company manager and stay-at-home father. “If the person is not up to the job, it could all fall apart here.” While the political forces in Le Havre are different from the national dynamics, where the far-right National Rally is tipped to win the presidency, Le Havre is a testing ground for the type of politics Philippe wants to offer France: debt reduction, long-term investments, and fewer hand-outs. He describes himself as “offering very ambitious projects for Le Havre.” The man who might bring Philippe down is hardly a political big gun. Jean-Paul Lecoq is a 67-year-old electrician who spent much of his life repairing typewriters in Le Havre. | Lou Benoist/AFP via Getty Images “There are few freebies in our campaign, whether it’s free water or transport,” he told a group of voters. If you stop investing in the city, he argued, eventually “it hurts a lot.” But retiree Linda Deloge wanted him to put more resources into childcare and housing. “I’m fed up with all the road works,” complained Deloge, who voted for Philippe in the last election but is undecided this time. Deloge said Phillippe’s track record was “pretty good,” particularly on rehabilitating run-down neighborhoods, but added she wanted a greater focus on welfare. DOUBLE OR NOTHING The National Rally is relishing its position as potential kingmaker in Le Havre. In the 2020 municipal election the RN failed to make the second round, but this time it could do so, challenging Philippe to his right. The RN has betrayed no willingness to step back in the second round to help Philippe. “We’ll never pull out,” said one adviser to National Rally leader Marine Le Pen, who was granted anonymity to speak candidly about party strategy. Even if it lets the Communists in? “We don’t care,” he said. Philippe, one of President Emmanuel Macron’s most popular former lieutenants, has been mayor of this city in Normandy since 2020. | Pool photo by Benoit Tessier/AFP via Getty Images A poll published late last year showed that far-right leader Bardella would win in most second-round scenarios against mainstream candidates, but that Philippe posed the biggest threat, securing 47 percent to Bardella’s 53 percent. Indeed, Philippe’s supporters say the far right is deliberately exploiting local politics to wipe him out ahead of the presidential election. “The National Rally candidate is such a caricature of the outsider who has been parachuted in to stir things up,” said a former adviser from Philippe’s Horizons party, a reference to Keller, who was a councilor in the upscale Paris neighborhood of Neuilly-sur-Seine. “The National Rally isn’t going to win this election, so all they are going to do is favor a Communist candidate.” Although polls have repeatedly shown Philippe as having the best shot against the far right in 2027, he is being challenged within his own camp by a glut of presidential hopefuls including former Prime Minister Gabriel Attal, conservative former Interior Minister Bruno Retailleau, former Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin and many others. A hard-earned victory in a dockers’ city would propel Philippe ahead of his rivals, his supporters argue, and cement him as a locally-rooted politician who can appeal to voters beyond the center right. “It’s like a party primary for him,” said Gilles Boyer, an MEP and longtime ally of Philippe. “The Havre is a difficult city. If he wins this election … it’ll give him a boost.” Philippe also tells his electorate that his national ambitions could help them too. “I tell the people here, that if by an extraordinary chance, someone from Le Havre became president of France, it wouldn’t be a bad thing for Le Havre,” he said. Sarah Paillou contributed reporting.