What follows is a Q and A conducted by James Edwards with Anke Van dermeersch, a former Miss Belgium, Miss Universe finalist, and current Senator of Belgium.

James Edwards: You first made a name for yourself as a model who was crowned Miss Belgium and who went on to become a top finalist in the Miss Universe pageant. What do you remember about those days?

Anke Van dermeersch: It was fantastic to be Miss Belgium as an 18-year-old girl and to travel around the world to the various international Miss competitions. I enjoyed it immensely and learned a lot. The university of life is incredibly interesting. You learn a lot that you don’t get told at the real universities.

I would participate in the Miss Belgium pageant again, but would never become Miss Belgium again. Because to become Miss Belgium nowadays you have to bring a politically correct opinion, have a color, or be transgender. Everything else doesn’t matter anymore.

I sometimes say: if a Miss Belgium becomes a Flemish nationalist, then there must be something seriously wrong with Belgium!

Edwards: Not many people make the career transition from modeling to politics, but you were able to do both on the very biggest of stages. How did that happen?

Van dermeersch: After my career as a Miss, I graduated as a lawyer. I wanted to become a lawyer to help people and did so for 10 years, but soon felt that I didn’t get any satisfaction from it. That’s why I became a member of the Vlaams Blok and later the Vlaams Belang. Through politics, I can help many more people at the same time by making adjustments to the legislation in our country. In the first few years, I was mainly militant in Antwerp, where I was born and raised. As a former Miss Belgium, I was the first well-known Fleming and lawyer to go against the cordon mediatique and sanitaire around the Vlaams Blok. In 2003 I took part in the elections for the Belgian Senate for the first time and I immediately received a huge number of preferential votes. A Miss Belgium in politics, that was unprecedented! I have also been re-elected ever since.

Edwards: What issues did you run on when you were first elected as a Senator of Belgium?

Van dermeersch: Among other things, I am ‘the mother’ of the European burqa ban. I wrote the first legislation for a burqa ban in 2003 and it has ever since been the basis of burqa bans throughout Europe.

As a citizen of Antwerp, I also closely follow all dossiers that concern the province of Antwerp and its city in terms of mobility, public works, education, housing, work and the economy.

As a senator since 2003, I have taken many initiatives to bring about the orderly division of the Belgian Union and to put Flanders on the road to independence. I know better than anyone the specific powers of the Senate, which are mainly focused on the Constitution and legislation on the organization and functioning of the federal state.

As a former tax lawyer, and lawyer-tax specialist, I naturally feel like a fish in water when it comes to financial and tax laws/policies. That is why I am also an elected member of the Flemish Parliament, putting the Flemish government to the test with regard to the Flemish public finances.

Edwards: You have held high office in your country since 2003. How do you continue to make your message attractive to voters?

Van dermeersch: As a former Miss, I have a lot of credit with the Belgian public. When I proclaim hard positions, they come across as less harsh and people start to think about my points of view instead of immediately classifying it as extreme. After all, our positions are not extreme, but radical. This is based on the Latin word ‘radix’, which means root. We want to get to the root of the problems.

Of course, my way of speaking is not what the media wants. They want to portray my party as dangerous and extreme, but a look at me and people realize that I am not the image that fits. That’s why I’m almost not allowed to be featured in the traditional media, because that’s not the image they want.

I want people to think for themselves and not let opinions be imposed on them by the mainstream media. That works out pretty well because I have been a Senator, Flemish Member of Parliament, and Antwerp City Councilmember for more than 20 consecutive years now. I defend my constituents at all political levels wholeheartedly.

Edwards: Your colleague in the Belgian Parliament, Dries Van Langenhove, was recently sentenced to prison in one of the most contemptible and unjust court decisions I have ever seen. What was your reaction to this?

Van dermeersch: Dries Van Langenhove received the heaviest possible punishment. He was convicted by the court of, among other things, racism and negationism. For this, he received an effective prison sentence of 1 year and a fine of 16,000 euros. He was also stripped of his civil rights for 10 years, preventing him from exercising political office.

In a healthy democracy, ideas are fought with ideas. The writing is therefore on the wall that the public prosecutor’s office took legal action and severely punished an opinion offense. For a democratic state governed by the rule of law, punishing those who mobilize politically around political ideas is a death blow.

Moreover, it was also about estimating memes as an opinion rather than humor. Inevitably, persecution of humor turns into a process of intention. This is a shame, because as the saying goes, “What can no longer be said with laughter is not the truth.�

Edwards: It seems almost paradoxical that such a verdict would be rendered in Belgium, where your party, Vlaams Belang, one of the most powerful nationalist parties in the world, has become the country’s most popular. How do you reconcile this?

Van dermeersch: The elite wants to fight the Vlaams Belang by all means and it is not the first time that they have done this through the courts. In 2004, the Vlaams Blok, the party before the current Vlaams Belang, was condemned for racism, but a few months later the voters responded to the elite with a maximum of votes.

Because of the conviction, we were pushed even more into the role of victim and the ideas of the people and the plans of our party remained what they were. Also, this time, the day after the upcoming elections on Sunday, June 9, 2024, the other parties will wake up with a hangover like in 2004. History repeats itself and the Vlaams Belang is getting stronger and stronger.

There is no way out for the elite, the people will take back power, and the people are us.

Edwards: Thankfully, there has been a very vocal outcry to what has happened. Elon Musk recently raised awareness about Van Langenhove’s situation on X and has personally engaged with him. Has such solidarity been encouraging for you to see?

Van dermeersch: I’m not a big fan of Elon Musk.

He has indeed raised awareness about Van Langenhove’s situation and I think that’s a good thing, of course, but also on X there is no free speech possible to this day.

For example, I have been shadow-banned for years now. Elon Musk’s takeover of Twitter and its transformation to X didn’t help that either.

Not everything Elon Musk does should be accepted and followed, especially when it comes to new technologies and AI in particular.

Edwards: Speaking of Vlaams Belang, how has it been able to enjoy such sustained success while many other nationalist parties in Europe burn quickly and fizzle out?

Van dermeersch: The Vlaams Belang is a party with a very long history dating back to the First World War.

The Vlaams Belang was founded in 2004 as the successor to the Vlaams Blok, which first emerged in elections in 1978, but the undercurrent of Flemish nationalism on which the parties are built arose during the First World War, when Flemish soldiers received orders in French while they only understood Dutch. The contempt of the French-speaking elite towards the Flemish population is the basis of the struggle for change that we are waging to this day.

There have also been other parties that have emerged on this basis, such as the Volksunie and the current N-VA, but in the end they have always put themselves at the service of the elite out of opportunism. We don’t!

Edwards: The Islamization of Europe is something that you have been very outspoken about. Do you believe that the Great Replacement can be reversed?

Van dermeersch: The vast majority of the European population is in favor of restricting and even completely stopping any form of non-European immigration to Europe.

The assumption that we need migrant workers to keep our economy afloat; the idea that we need young foreigners to sustain our population and combat the ageing of the population, and the idea that we have to solve crisis after crisis – anywhere in the world – by bringing in a new wave of economic and war refugees is as destructive as it is dangerous.

The population is already aware of this. So yes, with the support of the people, it is possible to turn the tide.

Edwards: Do you believe that an independent Flemish Republic could ever be established?

Van dermeersch: Yes, there is a tendency to create a Europe of peoples to replace the current undemocratic EU in Europe. The Vlaams Belang is a Flemish nationalist party and we are therefore striving to split up Belgium and establish a Flemish (and Walloon) state.

For an independent Flanders, the Vlaams Belang sees a special relationship with the Netherlands. This is based on a Dutch cultural community in Europe.

For our party, Flemish independence is the most important point on the program. For the Vlaams Belang it is a matter of principle, based on the right of self-determination of peoples. The most fundamental argument in favor of Flemish independence is the annual financial transfers from Flanders to Wallonia and the disagreement between Flemish and Walloon politicians that make a coherent federal policy impossible. An independent Flemish state would be able to use the tax money of the Flemish people to pursue a much more efficient policy to solve the problems of the population in terms of healthcare, education, infrastructure, etc.

Edwards: What other issues and projects are you currently working on?

Van dermeersch: At the moment I’m in campaign mode, because there are national and local elections this year. On both, 9 June and 13 October, I will be re-elected to all my mandates. After that, I will help to put together a new government to meet all the needs of our constituents in the best possible way. That’s a huge amount of work and many grueling working days, but I do it with love and passion.

This article was originally published by American Free Press.