“In Brussels, no one hears you scream” — spin doctor Kasper Juul in the Danish political TV drama “Borgen.”
For some politicians, Brussels is where you are sent when you are problematic or no longer needed back home.
For others, there’s the chance to get a prestigious position that goes beyond rank or experience.
At the same time, bureaucrats with little or no media experience appear before the cameras every weekday as European Commission spokespeople, while career diplomats find themselves handling dossiers with major consequences for domestic politics.
All these people are united by a belief, to some degree, in the EU project. But working in Brussels can turn into a nightmare (despite the visibility, high salary, and other perks).
Here’s who we think have the five hardest jobs in Brussels, and why:
Mark Rutte, NATO secretary-general
He may have been given the nickname “Teflon” by officials in the Netherlands and NATO — because nothing sticks to him — but with Donald Trump in the White House, Rutte’s job is surely the toughest in Brussels.
His role at present is seemingly less about running the military alliance and more about trying to stop one man — Trump — from dismantling the entire thing. And the former Dutch prime minister is having some success in his role as Trump whisperer. Not long after he used his speech in Davos last week to double down on wanting Greenland, the U.S. president met with Rutte and surprisingly announced that they had “formed the framework of a future deal.”
However, it does put Rutte in some awkward situations. Last March, when Rutte and Trump met in the Oval Office, the U.S. president said he wanted to annex Greenland, to which the Dutchman could only reply “I don’t want to drag NATO” into it, which angered the Danes. No provision in the alliance’s 1949 founding treaty envisions one NATO ally attacking another, and Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen and others warned that an invasion would mean the end of the alliance. Rutte earlier this month said NATO is “not at all” in crisis.
Rutte also raised eyebrows when he called Trump “daddy” — a comment he tried to row back on.
Rutte’s office didn’t respond to a request for a comment for this article.
“I perfectly understand how difficult is his job [to keep NATO unity], but it’s such a pain to watch him,” said a senior EU diplomat, granted anonymity to speak freely, as were others in this article.
“Walking on a tightrope in a headwind is easier than NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte’s job,” said Nicolás Pascual de la Parte, former Spanish NATO ambassador and now a member of the European Parliament’s Security and Defense Committee for the European People’s Party. “Keeping the Atlantic alliance united under present circumstances requires unparalleled statesmanship to temper down Trump’s relentless brinkmanship.”
Paula Pinho, Commission chief spokesperson
In the von der Leyen era, the job of chief spokesperson has become a very tough gig. Officials say that the Commission president works in a (metaphorical) bunker, with only her head of cabinet, Björn Seibert, in the loop while everyone else is either left in the dark or informed only on a strictly need-to-know basis — very different from the more collegial style of her predecessor, Jean-Claude Juncker.
That makes the job of Portuguese official Paula Pinho, appointed Commission chief spokesperson in November 2024 and a lawyer by training, one of the most difficult in Brussels as she has to face questions from journalists in front of the cameras every working day. But often Pinho — a German speaker close to Michael Hager, considered a Seibert ally and who is head of Cabinet for Valdis Dombrovskis — cannot respond either because she’s not allowed to or because she’s not been given the answer, officials and diplomats say.
It’s made the Commission more closed off than ever. Last January, when Ursula von der Leyen was hospitalized with pneumonia, it was the German news agency DPA that broke the news. The following month, even the famously non-transparent Vatican didn’t hide the fact that Pope Francis had been taken to hospital.
When Pinho’s predecessor, Eric Mamer, moved on, there were jokes among officials about how many bottles of champagne he opened to celebrate that he was finally free. At least Mamer’s sacrifice was rewarded: when he left, he got the position of director general in the environment department.
Pinho told POLITICO: “I am honoured to have what is among the unique jobs in Brussels. Certainly not measured in comfort or easiness of the tasks, but in responsibility and sobriety.”
She said part of the job “is to differentiate what the public needs to know and what some media would just love to know.”
Kaja Kallas, EU foreign policy chief
The European External Action Service, the bloc’s diplomatic body, was created in 2010 and the job of the top diplomat who leads it has always been a difficult one as member countries, especially the big ones, want to keep foreign policy in their own hands.
Relations between von der Leyen and the former holder of the role, Josep Borrell, were very bad, according to officials. It’s even worse with Kallas.
The Mediterranean area has been taken away from Kallas as the Commission last year created the Directorate-General for the Middle East, North Africa and the Gulf (DG MENA). At the same time, the Commission has been actively working on plans to cut down the size of the EEAS.
In an attempt to fight back, Kallas tried to appoint a powerful deputy secretary general in the form of Martin Selmayr, Juncker’s feared former chief of staff, but the move was blocked by von der Leyen’s office.
Kallas “privately complains that she [von der Leyen] is a dictator but there’s little or nothing she can do about that,” said one senior official. Kallas also comes from tiny Estonia, and her party, the liberals, is small, making her position even weaker than Borrell’s (a socialist from Spain).
Kallas’ office did not reply to a request for a comment.
Bálint Ódor, Hungarian ambassador
Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán likes to play the villain with his pro-Russia and pro-Trump lines, which makes the job of the country’s EU ambassador difficult. The current ambassador, Bálint Ódor, is seen as close to Orbán’s Fidesz party, unlike his predecessor, Tibor Stelbaczky, who now works for the EU’s diplomatic body.
When Hungarian ambassadors try to soften some of the harsh lines coming from the government, it creates suspicions in Budapest about their loyalty, said a Hungarian diplomat. One official described the Hungarian ambassador as the “elephant in the room,” because of the country’s close ties with the Kremlin.
During the Hungarian presidency of the Council of the EU last year, some diplomats raised concerns about sharing certain information with the Hungarians because of Orbán’ s proximity to Russia (Hungary’s Foreign Minister Péter Szijjártó holds regular meetings with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov, who is under EU sanctions). Ódor told POLITICO: “It’s a privilege to serve my country and represent Hungarian interests.”
Maroš Šefčovič, trade commissioner
When a dossier is hard to crack, send for the Moscow-educated Slovak commissioner, nicknamed Mr. Fix It.
The former member of the Slovak Communist Party has been a commissioner since October 2009, making him the longest-serving current commissioner, having served under José Manuel Barroso as well as Juncker and von der Leyen.
Šefčovič has been called upon to oversee the EU’s response to extraordinary (and complicated) challenges like Brexit and the European Green Deal, and now, in the age of Trump, he is in charge of trade. He does more than that, though. For instance, when von der Leyen didn’t want to go to the European Parliament in Strasbourg for a debate on whether to remove her (and therefore him) from office, she sent Šefčovič instead.
Šefčovič’s office didn’t respond to a request for comment.
