An Anti-Communist International

News headlines around the convention have been dominated by the diplomatic row that erupted after Milei called the wife of Spanish prime minister Pedro Sánchez  “corrupt” on stage. Yet the Argentinian president’s relationship with Vox predates his entry into frontline politics, having been one of the signatories of the 2020 Madrid Charter alongside the likes of Eduardo Bolsonaro and Chilean extremist José Antonio Kast. This was the founding document of the Vox-led, anti-leftist alliance, the Madrid Forum, which seeks to combat the spread of “communist-inspired totalitarian regimes” in Latin America.

As Podemos founder Miguel Urbán notes in his 2024 book Trumpismos, the Madrid Forum is looking to achieve something distinct from the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in the United States. Whereas the latter organizes periodic events bringing together international right-wing leaders and activists, the Madrid Forum aspires to be a permanent “international organisation of far-right parties,” with a yearly plan of action. As Urbán writes, “Vox has maintained a frenetic agenda of networking, trips and events with the objective of constructing the first stable framework for the coordination of far-right Latin American forces, one, moreover, which would have [itself] at the centre.”

This cross-border organization remains somewhat incipient. Yet according to a recent report from the Progressive International, the Madrid Forum’s “most important impact” so far “has been its ability to create and mobilise a network . . . to undermine left-wing governments in the region.” In this respect, a major investigation by a consortium of Latin American publications found politicians associated with the alliance have engaged in coordinated campaigns aimed at “delegitimizing the electoral results in several countries” — working across borders to amplify fake news stories of electoral fraud in Peru, Colombia, and Chile, backed up by organized online trolling campaigns.

In reality, the Madrid Forum also forms part of a broader far-right infrastructure of extremist Catholic associations, Latin American exiles, and reactionary think tanks in the Spanish capital, which has also helped turn the city into a key meeting point for authoritarian forces globally. Madrid regional premier Isabel Ayuso, from the radical wing of the conservative Popular Party, has adopted the Cuban exile slogan “Liberty or Communism,” while during a month of violent street protests over Sánchez’s reelection last November, the same far-right network and insurrectional rhetoric was mobilized in an attempt to cast doubt on the legitimacy of his parliamentary majority.

Tipping the Balance of Power

Milei carried over these tactics into Vox’s convention as he flew into Spain looking to pick a fight with the country’s center-left prime minister — even going so far as to denounce Sánchez’s “totalitarianism” and describing him as an “arrogant and delirious socialist” on his return to Buenos Aires. The ensuing diplomatic row, which saw Spain withdraw its ambassador to Argentina, kicked off Vox’s European election campaign with a bang.

Yet Abascal had also hoped to launch the campaign with both Le Pen and Meloni present on stage with him as he sought further protagonism internationally through fostering increased cooperation between two existing wings of the European extreme right. Both Meloni’s post-fascist Fratelli d’Italia and Le Pen’s Rassemblement National are currently leading in the polls in their respective countries, while the combined projected seats of their two EU-wide groupings would make the extreme right the second-largest force in the European Parliament.

Furthermore, with the Greens and Macron’s liberal Renew grouping expected to both suffer heavy losses, the European Parliament could potentially have a right-wing majority of MEPs for the first time in its history. This would not necessarily displace the dominant grand coalition of centrist parties but could allow the conservative European People’s Party (EPP) to secure an alternative majority in certain votes — such as those around environmental issues, civil liberties, or immigration.

Yet as academic Cas Mudde notes, this historic far-right surge “could become a Pyrrhic victory, if [the] parties remain so divided.” The ECR, which includes Fratelli, Vox, and Éric Zemmour’s Reconquête, diverges most from Le Pen’s Identity and Democracy group on foreign policy — as well as, as a result of that, on their degree of mainstream respectability. With her strict pro-NATO positioning, Meloni has cultivated closer links with the EPP since becoming prime minister and wants to keep the door open to a pact with Ursula von der Leyen over her reelection as head of the European Commission after June’s elections.

In this respect, her decision not to attend last Sunday’s event in person saw her seeking a difficult balancing act, with her video intervention designed to neither shut down Vox’s overtures to Le Pen or align herself with them. “We will see what happens after the elections,” one Vox official insisted — with the party seeing itself as best placed to operate as a pivot between the various groupings over the coming term.

In particular, the announcement this Tuesday from Le Pen and Matteo Salvini that their parties would no longer sit in the same group as Germany’s Alternative für Deutschland  opens up the possibility of a significant realignment on the European far right after the elections — as does the expected incorporation of Orbán’s Fidesz into ECR.

In any case, the threat of a major far-right advance is clear. “We the patriots must occupy Brussels,” proclaimed Orbán in his intervention at Vox’s convention while Chega’s Ventura asserted: “Europe is ours. Europe is ours!” In the wake of the June 9 poll, it will become clear how realistic this prospect is.