National politics
As a pupil and a student,Van Grieken was active in the NJSV and the NSV,eventually becoming national president of the NSV. Van Grieken became a member of Vlaams Blok in 2003 as a teenager and subsequently joined its successor Vlaams Belang. After his studies,Van Grieken was elected national president of Vlaams Belang Jongeren,the youth wing of Vlaams Belang. [3] In September 2014,he was nominated by the party's council to become the party's new leader. [4] At the party's congress in October he ran unopposed and obtained 93% of the votes,becoming Belgium's youngest party leader ever. [5]
Although initially known as a hardliner within the party,he has since attempted as leader to moderate the VB's image in order to break the cordon sanitaire imposed on the party,stating "There is no cordon sanitaire around our ideas,but there is about our style." [6]
He was a member of the municipal council of Mortsel from 2007 until 2018 and was elected to the Flemish Parliament in 2014. [7] He was elected as a member of the municipal council of Schoten,where he still lives now,in 2018.
Under his leadership the VB has seen a massive increase in public support,including finishing in second place in the Flemish region during the 2019 federal elections in which Van Grieken was elected to the Chamber of Representatives. Following the election,he became the first leader of the VB to attend a meeting with King Philippe along with the other main party leaders. [8]
In November 2019,he was reelected as party leader and obtained 97.4% of the votes. [9] The Vlaams Belang party has remained relatively popular under his leadership. In a poll published in December 2019, [10] Vlaams Belang polled 27.3 percent,making it the biggest party in Flanders and Belgium as a whole.
During the legislature 2019-2024,Vlaams Belang professionalized further and gained substantial support in numerous polls as the challenger of the system. Van Grieken was tipped by Politico as 'Disrupter No.6 - "The Breakup Artist" in their "Class of 2024"',referring to the secessionist position held by Van Grieken and his party. [11]
He was interviewed by The Wall Street Journal, [12] The Financial Times [13] and The Brussels Times [14] on his Flemish independentist and migration critical stance.
In the Flemish elections on 9 June 2024,Van Grieken was the lead candidate for Vlaams Belang in Antwerp and was re-elected to the Flemish Parliament with 153,596 preference votes. [15] Vlaams Belang gained substantially during the elections,becoming the biggest party in three of the five Flemish provinces and gaining a million votes in total in the European election. [16]
During the local elections on 13 October of that year,Van Grieken was once again the lead candidate in Schoten. He received 4,388 preference votes,more than the incumbent mayor. [17] After the local elections,the cordon sanitaire was broken locally in Ranst on the day that Tom Van Grieken celebrated his tenth year as president of the party. Afterwards the party also joined the municipal coalition in Izegem and Brecht,besides governing locally with an absolute majority in Ninove.
