The elections were held abroad, but for members of the MAGA movement, the rightward tilt in the European Parliament was still a chance to claim victory.
Steven K. Bannon, who ran former President Trump's 2016 campaign and served as a senior adviser in the White House, compared this week's election results to British voters' decision in June 2016 to leave the European Union, a historic measure that preceded Trump's surprise. victory for five months.
“Absolutely, shifting tectonic plates,” Bannon declared on his podcast Monday.
The European Union and the United States have very different political systems and practices, including the multiparty coalition building that takes place in Europe.
But there are some important lessons for the United States.
Who won the European Parliament choice?
Centrists won a clear overall victory in the 27-nation European Union. Germany's center-right European People's Party, Ursula von der Leyen, president of the bloc's European Commission, won the most seats in the 720-member parliament, according to preliminary results.
But the far right made significant gains, winning around 20% of parliamentary seats. To secure a second term, Von der Leyen has hinted that he could seek a coalition alliance with the Italian Brothers, Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni's party with neo-fascist roots.
The ultranationalist Alternative for Germany became the second largest political party in that country, surpassing the party of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
French President Emmanuel Macron called early elections after the far-right National Rally party won twice as many seats as his own party. Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo resigned after his party suffered a similar beating.
Still, not all 27 EU countries achieved such dramatic results.
“I don't think Europe has completely changed its character,” said Michael K. Miller, a professor of political science and international affairs at George Washington University. “It is essentially a re-election and a reaffirmation of the center right” and “a tilt towards the far right, but not the far right winning everything.”
Why are Trump supporters so excited?
Immigration, inflation and rejection of the mainstream (Trump's favorite themes) have all played a role in the rise of the far right in Europe.
“There is no denying that something is happening in the United States, in Europe,” Matt Schlapp, who heads the Conservative Political Action Conference, said of developments in the United States, Hungary and elsewhere that promote right-wing populism. “The themes are 80% the same.”
But the far right won only about 20% of seats in parliament, not a majority, making it difficult to draw an analogy with a Trump victory in the United States' two-party system, which requires a majority in the electoral college. said Andrew Gawthorpe, a professor at Leiden University. in the Netherlands who investigates American politics.
Should President Biden worry?
It depends on who you ask. Beyond the rise of the right, the elections showed a frustration with incumbents that has emerged in other countries, including India, where Prime Minister Narendra Modi won a third term by a surprisingly narrow margin in recent parliamentary elections. .
The “fatigue factor” was especially noticeable in France, where Macron has been in office since 2017, said Max Bergmann, a former Obama administration official who directs the Europe, Russia and Eurasia Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies. He compared the success of the far right in Germany to a midterm election in the United States, in which voters send a message to their top leaders without necessarily overthrowing them. President Obama, for example, saw his party lose badly in the 2010 congressional elections, but he still won his own re-election two years later.
The EU elections show the power of immigration as a wedge issue and reinforce the “absolute need” for Democrats in the United States to focus on kitchen table economics and abortion; The latter is an issue that European parties were missing, Celinda Lake, who led President Biden's 2020 polls, said in an email.
“This shows energy on the right,” he added. “These are things we have seen but 1718192700 affirmed.”
Although Obama bounced back in 2012, Biden's future is unclear and the EU elections suggest that some voters on both sides of the Atlantic share similar grievances. “It's certainly concerning,” Lake said.
The center remains in Europe, but why is it weakening?
Gawthorpe argues that the center in Europe is weakening for the same reason as in the United States: working-class voters are frustrated with social, racial and cultural change.
These voters, whom he likens to once-Democratic voters in the upper Midwest, have traditionally aligned themselves with left-wing parties on economic issues, but are shifting toward far-right parties in Europe, outperforming political parties. center-right who are moderate on immigration and culture. war issues. The movements have attracted rural voters on both continents.
“Isolationist and xenophobic messages work: They speak to people's fears and concerns in a way that voters find compelling,” said Allison McManus, managing director of national security and international policy at the Center for American Progress, a think tank. left-leaning. “The rise of the far right in Europe is not something we can see as separate from the far right in the United States,” she added. “We are learning from these games on the other side of the Atlantic.”
What difference does a two-party system make?
It is important in this case because voters in many European countries can choose from a multitude of parties across the political spectrum. That makes it easier for far-left and far-right parties to gain power, but harder for them to gain a majority.
In the United States, Trump has basically taken over the Republican Party and remade it, a different path than European parties, which are more accustomed to forming a coalition.
Still, some far-right parties in Europe seem inclined to move closer to other parties. That has been the case for Meloni, Italy's far-right prime minister, who won elections two years ago.
In France, Marine Le Pen is attempting the same feat. Le Pen's nationalist, anti-immigration and populist National Rally Party has been challenging the establishment for decades. A victory for Le Pen's party in the upcoming French elections would obviously send an even stronger message, given France's influence and close ties to the United States.
Times staff writer Laura King in Berlin contributed to this report.
