Friday, November 9, 2018

Europeans React to US Elections

by Soeren Kern • November 9, 2018 at 5:00 am

"Many commentators around the world have looked at the US election results as a chicken looks at a knife: not knowing exactly what to do with it.... It is now proven that Donald Trump's election was not an accident. The victory in the Senate, even if anticipated, shows for the first time in a great democracy that a populist can keep power after having begun to exercise it." — Les Échos.
"...Trump is expected significantly to increase pressure on Europeans to invest the target of two percent of gross domestic product (GDP) on defense. Above all, Berlin will face pressure to spend billions and billions of euros, because the federal government is far from achieving this goal." — Die Welt.
"Many in the country had hoped that the first full electoral verdict on the presidency of Donald Trump would deliver a decisive repudiation of Trumpism. The results do not bear this out." — Irish Times.

U.S. President Donald Trump arrives with Vice President Mike Pence to give remarks a day after the midterm elections on November 7, 2018 in the East Room of the White House in Washington, DC. (Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

The American midterm elections attracted intense interest in Europe, where much of the political and media establishment are hostile to U.S. President Donald J. Trump, and many had openly hoped that the vote on November 6 would weaken him and his legislative agenda.

Newspapers and magazines across Europe provided saturation coverage of the elections. The overwhelming majority of commentaries and editorials, while customarily vitriolic in tone, grudgingly acknowledged that the midterm results did not amount to the total repudiation of the Trump Administration and may even help the president's chances for reelection in November 2020.

In terms of transatlantic relations, many observers raised fears that if the Democrats, who won control of the House of Representatives, succeed in thwarting Trump's domestic initiatives, the president may place more focus on foreign policy and increase pressure on free-riding European allies to spend more for their own defense.