Just concluded European Union elections constituted another important step for far-right parties on the continent. They have racked up gains in many of the 27 EU countries, and the surprising scale of their victories is shake up the political establishment there and attracting attention in the United States.
The parts’ success embarrassed German Chancellor Olaf Scholz by overtaking his party and prompted French President Emmanuel Macron to call early legislative elections.
While the votes were still being counted on Tuesday, the gain for the right is just the latest example of how discontent with globalization And immigration fed a conservative and populist reaction in rich Western democracies. Former President Donald Trump victory 2016 is the most prominent example, but it is unclear whether the trends that have fueled the right in Europe will allow him to win another mandate. in November.
Indeed, aside from these striking parallels, there are key differences between the dynamics in Europe and the United States. And even with the right’s gains in the last European elections, the political center will likely retain control of the country. European Parliament.
“We are clearly at one of those points where the wind can blow either way,” said Charlies A. Kupchan, a fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations.
WHAT FOOD THE RIGHT IN EUROPE?
All EU countries have different political dynamics, and European parliamentary elections are often an opportunity for voters in each country to symbolically vote against those in power in their own country, since they are voting for the people who will take office in their own country. Brussels rather than their own capital. There was also a global crisis negative reactions towards incumbents this seems to have no ideological basis.
But the resurgence of the right in Europe is more than symbolic or random. It is fueled by frustration over the EU migrant crisis – a frustration that the right has been quick to amplify on online platforms – as well as regulations on climate change and other issues that were seen as hitting rural and less educated residents harder. Economic growth in much of Europe stagnated since the global recession of 2008, further fueling discontent with the status quo.
Far-right or populist parties are now at the helm of Italy and Slovakia and are part of ruling coalitions in other countries such as Finland, Sweden and, soon, the Netherlands.
Generally speaking, the strongest support for the right on the continent is among rural voters who have lower levels of education than those in urban areas and who say they are more comfortable with economic and social aspects of globalization. This all probably sounds very familiar to American voters, where similar divisions have been seen between Trump’s Republicans and President Joe Biden’s Democrats.
IS TRUMP SURFING THE SAME WAVE?
Trump has embraced the European rightin particular the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, whose so-called “illiberal democracy” has made him an icon for conservative populists who believe in limiting immigration and LGBTQ+ rights. He has supported several European conservative populists in their attempts at national leadership, and some of Trump’s top advisers have ties to the movement across the Atlantic.
One of these former advisors, Steve Bannoncalled the European elections a “plate tectonic shift” on his podcast on Monday.
“It’s like here in the United States, this is what MAGA does,” Bannon said, using the acronym for Trump’s Make America Great Again movement. “MAGA pulls us further to the right. And I think that’s not only a good thing, it’s necessary for the nation and necessary for the world.
Trump’s victory in 2016, despite lose the popular vote, was achieved in part through the commitment to build a wall between the United States and Mexico to limit immigration. This year he has criticized Biden on the influx of migrants crossing the southern border to seek asylum in the United States. Recognizing the scale of the problem, Biden moved to the right on immigration by issuing new regulations to close the border if the crossings are too high.
There are, however, some key differences between Trump and European populists, the most significant being their record on democracy. Trump attempted to overturn his defeat to Biden in 2020, culminating on January 6, 2021. attack on the US Capitol. He embraced this cause in his campaign to regain powercontinuing to repeat the lie that he was prevented from winning re-election because of widespread fraud and that he called those who stormed the Capitol “warriors” during a Las Vegas Rally on Sunday.
Steven Levitsky, a political scientist at Harvard and co-author of “How Democracies Die,” says this stands in stark contrast to European populists.
“They are much less overtly authoritarian than Trump,” Levitsky said. “None of these guys rejected the election results.”
This constitutes a political vulnerability for Trump, who continues make false statements that the Election 2020 has been stolen. Biden relentlessly attacked him January 6 and indicated that he would preserve democracy at the heart of his campaign. Trump supporters that targeted lost state election offices in every swing state in 2022 and Democrats hope the same dynamic will protect Biden this year.
Kupchan said Trump voters may be angrier and more desperate than their European counterparts because of that continent’s strong social safety net.
“One of the reasons why the center has remained in Europe and not in the United States is because the Americans have even more to fall,” he said. “If you’re a worker in Europe and you lost your job on a VW production line, you suffer, but you don’t have as many problems as someone in Michigan.”
Trump’s strongest support comes from older voters, unlike European populists who experts say do better among younger voters. And in America’s two-party system, the current election amounts to a game of chicken with voters, who will have to choose either Biden or Trump. The race can come down to who voters dislike the least and if third party candidates unable to gain any political power in the race, he will take away enough votes to doom one of the party’s two major candidates.
Trump’s victory is far from inevitable. You only need to look at Europe to see that conservative populism has its limits.
THE RIGHT CANNOT GO FURTHER
There have been limits to the gains of the right in Europe. Last year, Poland’s conservative populist government lost power. the voters chose for a center-left coalition. The UK left the EU thanks to a victory for conservative populism, but its conservative Tory party is I expect to lose big in the next elections, even if the opposition Labor Party does not plan to reverse Brexit.
Even at the heart of the power of conservative populism in Europe, in Hungary, there has been growing discontent with the government in place.
In countries where the right has taken power, such as in Italy, where the Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni Although the party doubled the number of its members in the European Parliament, this did not constitute a radical break. Meloni kept his country within the coalition support Ukraine’s fight against Russia. While she cracks down on the admission of migrants crossing the Mediterranean into the country, she and her neo-fascist Brothers of Italy party have made no fundamental changes to the country’s political and economic structure.
Matthias Matthisj, a professor of international political economy at Johns Hopkins University, said Italy could be an example of how populists will govern in Europe.
“They are going to be stricter on Muslim prayer and you will now be able to drive faster on the highway,” Matthisj said. “But on important issues – the budget, foreign policy – the only way for these populists to gain power is to stay at the center.”
This contrasts with Trump, who has embraced sweeping changes in American politics and how the federal government could act if he wins. Some analysts say a Trump victory could allow European populists like Meloni to move further to the right.
Even after the European elections, radical change is unlikely. EU President’s Christian Democrats Ursula von der Leyen has moved to the right to counter the populist surge and remains by far the largest party among the 720 members. The center still holds in Europe – it has just moved to the right. The next question is whether this will happen in the United States in November.
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Associated Press writes Ali Swenson in New York contributed to this report.