Representation of environmental issues: Is there a link between campaign and legislative behaviour in the European Parliament?

This article assesses the link between Members of the European Parliament's campaign salience and legislative behaviour, focusing on environmental issues. Environmental issues were discussed by several MEP candidates during the 2019 campaign and they were important for voters. Nonetheless, it is unclear whether MEPs were consistent with their campaign commitments in their parliamentary votes. MEPs’ environmental salience is computed by coding 50,393 campaign tweets and their legislative behaviour is assessed by examining roll-call votes on amendments related to emissions reduction. Results indicate that MEPs who focused more on environmental issues during the campaign cast more pro-environmental votes. This indicates that the European Parliament can exercise its representative role in domains relevant for EU policy.