Jaak Madison
Jaak Madison is an Estonian politician, the deputy chairman of the Conservative People's Party of Estonia and a member the European Parliament, where he is a member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, Delegation for relations with the United States and a substitute member for the Committee on Constitutional Affairs and the Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs.
Madison was elected to the parliament in 2015 election with 1883 votes. In April 2017, he was elected as the deputy chairman of the party. In 2019 he was elected as a Member of the European Parliament with 22 819 votes.
Political Views
Madison holds national conservative views. He sees it very important for Estonia to remain a nation state for Estonians.European Union
As a Member of the European Parliament, Jaak Madison is a soft Eurosceptic. He is not in favor of leaving the European Union, but he does want to reduce further federalization in the European Union. Madison believes that the European Union should return to its original form, that of an union for economic and trade cooperation between sovereign states. He has argued that a federalized European Union is the greatest threat to nation states.Madison has claimed that the European Union is already on its way to becoming a federal state, as member states lack many of the features of an independent state. As examples, he has pointed out that in order to re-establish emergency border control, permission must be sought from the European Commission, the contains exceptions depending on the legislation of the European Union and the constitutions of the member states are subject to the legislation of the European Union.
Madison has emphasized his opposition to the idea of a European Union Minister for Finance. He believes that issues such as government budget and immigration must be left to the Member States. As a candidate in the European Parliament elections, he argued that the use of qualified majority voting to set refugee quotas, change tax policy and other matters of national importance undermines Member States' sovereignty, as they deprive countries that are a minority in the vote of decision-making power on important issues.
Foreign Policy and Border Agreement with Russia
Madison holds the opinion that Estonia must withdraw its signature from the border agreement between Estonia and Russia and start new talks on the basis of the Treaty of Tartu, as with the current border treaty Estonia would lose 5.2% of its territory that was set in the Treaty. In 2018, Madison said that if the border treaty is ratified under the current conditions, Russia could claim that the Treat of Tarty, on which the Estonian state is based and which is the birth certificate of the Republic of Estonia, is no longer legally valid.He believes that in defense cooperation and security policy, Estonia cannot rely on France or Germany, because they are flirting with Russia. Instead he thinks Estonia should primarily cooperate with the other Baltic states, Poland, Hungary, the United States and Finland.
In 2018, in the foreign policy magazine , Madison named supporting and keeping in touch with Estonian communities abroad as a key issue for the survival of Estonia, which should not be compromised for realpolitical reasons. Madison also took this view on the issue of Estonians in Crimea, arguing that the occupation of Crimea by Russia must not mean that Estonia no longer supports Estonians living there. He stated that Estonia must pursue a value-based foreign policy, which means that any Estonian living anywhere in the world is important to Estonia and we should do everything in our power to keep their ties with Estonia.
Immigration and Citizenship
Madison believes that although mass immigration does not yet affect Estonia, in 10–50 years, if the current demographic and migration trends continue, Estonia will also be in danger of mass immigration. Therefore, he considers it important that Estonia carefully looks at what international organizations, agreements and policies it is committed to.In January 2019, he said that a low immigration quota was not a problem because there was free movement of labor in the European Union and an increase in the immigration quota would be only for cheap labor, which would lower local wages. Madison supports not having a quota for highly skilled workers who earn triple the average wage.
In 2018, he expressed the view that those with Estonian alien's passport who have lived in Estonia since 1991 should be given five years to decide what citizenship they want. Those who do not acquire Estonian citizenship during this period will have their residence permit revoked.
Social Issues
Madison is a staunch opponent of the legalization of same-sex cohabitation law and the right of same-sex couples to adopt. He considers the purpose of marriage to be to ensure the survival of society.He has argued that because, according to statistics, gender reassignment applicants are unsure of their desires and nearly half regret their gender reassignment, these people should be persuaded by advising and helping them. He opposes national facilitation of gender reassignment, which he says is a green light for deviant behavior.
According to him, abortion is justified in exceptional cases, such as when there is a risk to the mother's health. He sees the abundance of abortions as a big problem among Estonians and considers it important that abortions be reduced at all costs. He wants to avoid situations where abortions are performed too lightly due to confusion.
In 2017, he supported the idea of following the example of the United States and reintroducing the death penalty for especially serious crimes. This position was motivated by the murder of a girl by a reoffender. Madison thought society should not pay for the murderer's warm cell and food.
He believes that the issue of surrogate mothers is human trafficking. People who get a child using a surrogate mother should be punished.
Controversy
Blog posts
In March 2015, media reported about Madison’s old blog post which defended the economic aspects of the Nazi regime. He had written: "It is true that there were concentration camps, forced labour camps, games with gas chambers were being played, but at the same time such a 'strict' order brought Germany at the time out of a thorough shithole, because development, that admittedly concentrated primarily on the development of the military industry, brought the country only within a couple of years to one of the most powerful in Europe."His blog post further claimed that while Madison did not seek to justify Nazi mass murders, he nonetheless felt that the Holocaust had 'positive aspects'. The media also cited his comments from spring 2014 that "It is unfortunately a fact that only now it is being more widely understood and recognized that a national purification is needed, that would create premises that exactly those pro-Estonian ones would gain superiority among the Russians". This was largely condemned by public and the Reform Party, which left EKRE out of the coalition talks. The PM Taavi Rõivas pointed out it was causing him grief that a young politician treated Nazism that had caused so much suffering to people in a justifying manner and wondered, whether sugarcoating fascism and ridiculing crimes against humanity was a general line of Madison's party.
Incidents
Madison raised controversy again later in March, when he was fined for retaining a passenger’s lost smartphone, which he should have placed in "lost and found" and selling it online while working for ferry company Tallink. In April, some female workers of Tallink also accused Madison of sexual harassment and sexual assault. Tallink launched an internal investigation of the incidents, whilst Madison called the accusations absurd.Views
He has labelled gay people as deviants.In May 2019, during an interview with The Guardian, he did not disown his earlier views from 2015 about praising the "positive aspects" Nazi Germany - his explanation being, that "pushing people to camps was wrong", but the unemployment rate "was low".
In August 2019, Madison used the term "Final Solution" within the context of Syrian refugees, using the phrase "Die endgültige Lösung ist erforderlich.". The same phrase was used in Nazi Germany, which caused the action to make headlines. Madison protected the saying, claiming he doesn't want the Holocaust or concentration camps, but an end to the refugee crisis.