Like many Europeans, I had hoped to be breathing a sigh of relief this morning. An election victory for Donald Trump was, however, always looking the more likely outcome. As I write this on the morning of 6 November, he is within touching distance of the finishing line and has boasted of 'a magnificent victory'. It looks like the Republicans will have a majority in the Senate after yesterday's voting, and I am assuming that the party will also hold on to its slim majority in the House of Representatives.
Truckloads of copy will be written about the election in the coming hours and days. I do not pretend to have anything original to say. I do wish to scribble some initial thoughts about the foreign policy implications, if only for my own record. My argument is that the second Trump presidency will not merely be a repeat of the first one.
Domestic differences
My main reason for thinking that this time round will be different is that Trump will be less constrained in what he does. During his previous term, many observers expected Trump to more or less capitulate to Russia. Yet, despite having given Vladimir Putin 'an "A" for leadership' on the campaign trail in 2015, the US expelled Russian diplomats and expanded sanctions on Moscow under an act called CAATSA. Despite talk of a 'bromance' when Trump and Putin met for a 2018 summit in Helsinki, the US soon after withdrew from two key arms control treaties against Russia's wishes. Various forces – checks and balances, if you like – constrained President Trump.
It looks like he will begin his new term next year with Republicans controlling both chambers in Congress. That was also the case when he took office in January 2017. The Republicans had a majority in the upper chamber, the Senate, throughout the whole of Trump's previous tenure. The Republicans lost their majority in the House of Representatives in the 2018 midterms.
Importantly, and unlike today, there was a significant opposition to Trump from Republicans in Congress after the 2016 win. While many senior Republican figures came out against Trump ahead of the 2024 election, they tended to be former officials, senators and representatives. That means that he may have fewer institutional constraints than previously, at least until the midterm elections in 2026. There may still be some dissent from Republicans in Congress, but I would posit that the party's current crop of senators and representatives see their position as being dependent on Trump in a way that wasn't the case last time round. They recognise that Trump embodies a popular movement that has captured the hearts and minds of tens of millions of American voters, hard as that may be for many in Europe to understand.
Another constraint on Trump last time round was his own appointments. The repeated fallings out within his own administration mired effective policymaking. We can expect him to be far more savvy on this occasion when appointing his cabinet. He will want to be surrounded by 'yes-men' and 'yes-women'. One only has to look at his choice of running mate, JD Vance, whom I struggle to imagine having the gumption to disagree with Trump; just see how quickly he disowned his past comments that Trump was 'reprehensible' and pondering that he might be 'America's Hitler' (that came in a Facebook post he wrote in 2016).
I don't think we should expect the next four years to be characterised by the same degree of fallings out within Trump's own administration.
A changed world
The other major reason for thinking this time round will be different is the world the next president inherits. For all the domestic acrimony he causes, Trump has endeavoured to present himself as a man promoting peace. In his victory speech earlier today he said: 'You know, we had no war in four years [2017-2020]... I'm not going to start a war. I'm going to stop wars.' He takes over with wars raging in Ukraine, the Middle East and Sudan.
His claim that he will end the war between Russia and Ukraine in 24 hours is nonsense. Russian officials are working hard to deepen cooperation with China, Iran and North Korea. As I wrote in my last newsletter: 'Russia certainly shows no signs of wishing to negotiate an end to the invasion; its efforts are squarely focused on obtaining additional support from its partners.' With Russia uninterested in withdrawing its troops, Ukraine is looking to mobilise more people and anxious about what Trump's election means for its defence. (Trump called Volodomyr Zelenskyy 'the greatest salesman on earth'; a criticism of the Ukrainian president's ability to persuade the US to keep giving military aid.) There is little to suggest Ukraine's president is ready to bend to Trump's demands, not least given they appear to involve ceding the Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory.
Trump's election also has implications for the war in the Middle East. He hasn't shown much concern for the Palestinian cause although he has, reportedly, told Benjamin Netanyahu that he wants to see the war ended quickly. Israel may see that as signal that it has a freer hand to prosecute its war without self-restraint. The Biden administration, which has had mixed success at restraining Israel, will have little influence over Israel in the weeks before Trump returns to office. Ultimately, it's as hard to imagine Trump – who in 2017 recognised Jerusalem as the capital of Israel – stopping this war as the one in Ukraine.
The tensions between the US and China will probably intensify, as well. What is undeniable is that China, as others, will look to test the new US administration early on, to see how Washington responds in order to gauge what foreign policy choices are open to Beijing in the future. Alarmist stories about China's plans to seize Taiwan will proliferate in the media in the weeks ahead. China has practised blockading the island and, according to Condoleezza Rice writing in Foreign Affairs, the US and China have very few 'deconfliction measures' in place. As I wrote in a previous blog, a number of hawks who talk up a coming US military confrontation with China could be handed jobs in the next Trump administration, figures such as Robert Lighthizer, Elbridge Colby or Robert O'Brien.
Trump says he will whack a 60% tariff on imports from China. At the very least, we can expect the next four years to feature an ever fiercer trade war between the US and China.
Ringing the changes? (Or the tyranny of the majority)
Trump remains a vulgar and (relatively) unpredictable character. I took Putin at his word earlier this year when he said, long before Kamala Harris entered the race, that he would have preferred Joe Biden to Trump in the White House. While some Russians are jubilant about Trump's victory, I expect there is a mood of uncertainty in the Kremlin.
There are ample reasons to be gloomy about the international repercussions of the American election. With fewer congressional constraints, Trump will be freer to appoint his first-choice nominees to cabinet posts and pursue his domestic and foreign policy agenda. Still, the last presidency was not an utter tragedy and so we must hope that this one doesn't prove an utter farce. I'm inclined to think that claims of a threat to NATO's survival are overblown. On climate change, Trump displays a worrying uninterest in taking the issue seriously but I'm not convinced any prospective American leader has been prepared to go far enough.
The rest of the west has to step up. This morning many European leaders will be lamenting that Harris didn't win. There will be glib talk of this being 'Europe's moment' and about 'European unity'. In my opinion, I regret to say, that is mere noise. In the UK, France, Germany, and elsewhere, leaders have to work together where they can and at times ignore the US which won't much consider Europe's interests under Trump. Finding consensus on how to enhance support for Ukraine is European leaders' first test. What unity emerges will largely rest on the lowest common denominator. Otherwise it falls to states' unilateral decisions: they would be better off focusing on recalibrating their own support rather than lobbying the incoming Trump administration.
The political elite in the rest of the west also has to recognise that the forces that propelled Trump to this victory exist in their own societies, that here too many voters are not fussed about the democratic process and an erratic leader (remember Boris). If voters think someone is standing up for their interests, economic or social, then they will vote for that person. And that, for all the entirely justified nervousness among elites about the Trumpian threat to democracy in America and beyond, is the people's democratic right.
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