STRASBOURG — The right-hand man of European People’s Party leader Manfred Weber, Tom Vandenkendelaere, resigned Wednesday to take a private-sector job in Belgium, he told POLITICO.
Vandenkendelaere will leave EPP headquarters at the end of May with no successor yet lined up, leaving vacant the powerful chief of staff job — which involves overseeing the party’s day-to-day operations. He quit in order to spend more time with his family, according to two people with knowledge of the decision who were granted anonymity to speak freely.
The EPP is both a pan-European political party, which is where Vandenkendelaere worked, and a group in the European Parliament. Weber leads both.