Why Intra-EU Migrants Support Anti-EU Political Competitors in Their Home Countries

The freedom of movement in the European Union (EU) is one of the main benefits for the European citizens. Intra-EU migrants arguably feel the advantages of this policy more than others. Yet, some of them vote for political parties or candidates that advocate against the EU, including a potential exit of their country. At a glance, such a behaviour is counter intuitive. To address this puzzle, our paper analyses the reasons for which the Romanian migrants supported in the 2024 November and December presidential and parliamentary elections in Romania candidates that openly spoke against the EU. More than half of the Romanian migrants voted with radical-right nationalist parties with such a rhetoric. We use 35 semi-structured interviews with Romanian migrants in France, Italy, Spain and Germany, where the electoral support for these parties and candidates was as high as 70%. The interviews were conducted in January-February 2025 and explore the role of identity, values, salient issues, and political priorities in voting with the radical-right competitors.