| René Claassen | |
| Office: | Member of the House of Representatives |
| Term Start: | 6 December 2023 |
| Office2: | Member of the Provincial Council of Limburg |
| Term Start2: | 28 March 2019 |
| Term End2: | 6 December 2023 |
| Office1: | Municipal councilor of Landgraaf |
| Term Start1: | 30 March 2022 |
| Term End1: | 6 December 2023 |
| Birth Name: | R.A.B. Claassen |
| Birth Date: | 13 July 1971 |
| Birth Place: | Heerlen, Netherlands |
| Party: | PVV |
| Alma Mater: | Maastricht University (MSc) |
René A.B. Claassen (born 13 July 1971) is a Dutch politician representing the Party for Freedom (PVV). He was a member of the Provincial Council of Limburg starting in 2019, and he has served as a member of the House of Representatives since the 2023 Dutch general election.
Claassen was born in Heerlen's Zuyderland Hospital on 13 July 1971. His father was a member of the Labour Party and a senior union leader of Abvakabo. Claassen was raised Catholic, but he has said that he was "cured of Roman Catholicism" after visiting Vatican City at age seventeen, concluding it was a charade.[1] Claassen completed his nursing training in the late 1980s, and he worked as a hospital nurse for over twenty years, successively in a pediatric ward and an intensive care unit. He was employed by the Zuyderland Hospital for most of that period. He switched careers in 2008 and became a healthcare educator and manager at the Zuyd University of Applied Sciences. He also completed a master's degree in applied science at Maastricht University.[2] [3] [4]
In a 2024 interview, Claassen described that he was inspired by the rise of right-wing politician Pim Fortuyn. Poverty was rising in Heerlen as a result of the closure of coal mines in the region, and Claassen believe those issues could only be solved by the political right.[2] He was elected to the Provincial Council of Limburg in March 2019 and to the municipal council of Landgraaf in March 2022. He stepped down from both positions in December 2023.[3]
During the 2023 Dutch general election, he was elected to the House of Representatives as the PVV's sixth candidate, and he became the party's spokesperson for curative healthcare.[2] [5] When the House was considering to expand a pilot program to legalize the cultivation and supply of cannabis, Claassen instead proposed to put it on hold. His motion was not supported by a majority.[6]
| Body | Party | Votes | Result | . | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Party seats | Individual | |||||||||||
| 2021 | House of Representatives | Party for Freedom | style=text-align:right | 31 | style=text-align:right | 657 | style=text-align:right | 17 | [7] | |||
| 2023 | House of Representatives | Party for Freedom | style=text-align:right | 6 | style=text-align:right | 3,764 | style=text-align:right | 37 | [8] |