EU budget proposals: more external migration control, less democratic scrutiny
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Country/Region
01 September 2025
In mid-July, the European Commission published its proposal for the EU’s next long-term budget, for the period from 2028 to 2034. The Commission wants €200 billion for “external action” – a 75% increase from the current budget. Within this, external migration control remains a high priority. The Commission wants to penalise states that don’t comply with EU migration policies, whilst undermining official development aid standards and limiting democratic oversight.
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Image: Marek Studzinski, Unsplash
From home affairs to foreign affairs
In mid-July the European Commission published its proposal for the next long-term budget – the 2028 – 2034 multiannual financial framework (MFF).
Under the proposals, EU funding for home affairs funding would triple to €81 billion (pdf), while external action is set to receive €200.3 billion through a new ‘Global Europe’ instrument (pdf).
The political groundwork for this increase was laid in the Commission’s February 2025 Communication, ‘The road to the next multiannual financial framework’ (pdf), which frames the budget as a tool for advancing the EU’s “strategic interests” in a world marked by “geopolitical instability” and the “weaponisation of migration.”
The communication calls for “effective protection of the EU’s external borders” alongside “mutually beneficial partnerships” with countries of origin and transit.
Frontex funding doubles
The €81 billion home affairs budget will support the implementation of the Pact on Migration and Asylum, with spending priorities that reflect a focus on enforcement.
€15.4 billion is allocated for border management and Frontex’s budget would double to €11.9 billion, an increase that will be used to implement the latest round of new powers for the agency.
A further €12 billion is planned for the Asylum, Migration, and Integration Fund (AMIF) (pdf), which is tasked with supporting asylum systems and financing the “effective, safe and dignified return” of third-country nationals.
While migrants’ integration is formally listed as one of the AMIF’s objectives, it is marginal in both scope and visibility. The proposal specifies that EU integration support should focus on measures “generally implemented in the early stages” with longer-term support left to other EU instruments.
A new architecture for external action
Internal enforcement dominates the home affairs budget, but the external dimension of migration control is no less central. The Global Europe proposal (pdf) brings development aid, humanitarian assistance, and pre-accession support for EU candidate countries under one €200 billion envelope.
The budget is dispersed via two types of funding: programmable funds for planned, multi-year projects; and non-programmable funds for rapid crisis response.
The new instrument prioritises “budgetary flexibility” over focus. There are no binding spending targets for areas such as climate action, gender equality or environmental protection. Instead, a new “mainstreaming” principle requiring these objectives be “taken into account” in programme design.
With no fixed financial commitments, these goals risk being sidelined when political imperatives, such as migration control, take precedence.
Find out more about Europe's border externalisation agenda in our monthly bulletin, Outsourcing Borders
Diminished democratic oversight
This shift is supported by the establishment of a €14.8 billion “emerging challenges and priorities cushion”.
The Commission would be able to use this at will, with an obligation only to “inform” the Parliament and Council, rather than seeking their formal approval. This greatly diminishes democratic oversight over a significant part of the budget.
The geographic breakdown of the indicative funding allocations confirms that migration remains a key external priority. Sub-Saharan Africa is allocated €60.5 billion, while the Middle East, North Africa, and Gulf region has been assigned €42.9 billion.
These regions, in which the EU has longstanding partnerships for its externalisation agenda, receive significantly more than Asia and the Pacific (€17 billion) or Latin America and the Caribbean (€9.1 billion).
Even a rule that 90% of the budget qualify as Official Development Assistance (ODA) is not absolute. The Global Europe proposal includes a clause allowing amendment of the ODA target through delegated acts.
Development as leverage
The Global Europe instrument adopts the language of its predecessor, the ‘Neighbourhood, Development and International Cooperation Instrument – Global Europe’.
Its aims include building “mutually beneficial partnerships” with countries of origin and transit, and addressing the “root causes of irregular migration”.
But while the language remains diplomatic, the enforcement tools have sharpened.
Under Article 12 of the draft Global Europe rules, the Commission can suspend payments or programmes if there are “serious shortcomings in a partner country related in particular to the obligation to readmit its own nationals from the Member States.”
In short: payments will be halted to states that refuse to accept deportations, an ongoing issue for the EU and its member states in their push to increase deportations.
All funding except humanitarian aid can be withheld on these grounds. The change makes development assistance a direct tool of leverage – conditioning aid on cooperation with EU migration control.
What comes next
The proposal marks the start of what will be lengthy negotiations with the European Parliament and Council.
While the final budget is likely to change, the direction of travel is clear.
The Commission has chosen to settle long-standing tensions between development goals and political priorities by siding firmly with the latter.
It consolidates a shift away from a values-based external policy towards one increasingly at the service of border enforcement – with serious implications for global partnerships and the EU’s credibility as a rights-based actor.
Author: Trine Odin
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Further reading
Moving borders with history: new ways of thinking about border externalisation
Europe is doubling down on its outsourcing of border controls to other states, particularly in Africa - and new ways of thinking about border externalisation are needed to generate effective responses. A recent academic article, summarised here, argues that postcolonial and decolonial analysis can help generate those responses.
Exporting Borders: Frontex and the Expansion of Fortress Europe in West Africa
The EU is pushing its migration control far beyond Europe’s borders. This report, co-published with the Transnational Institute, exposes how Frontex operates in West Africa under the cover of cooperation, entrenching neo-colonial influence, undermining rights, and reshaping the Sahel into a securitised buffer zone.
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