If Europe keeps placating its own far right, how can it possibly stand up to Trump? | Thu Nguyen and Jannik Jansen

<p>European leaders have been pulled to the right on migration, the climate crisis and Israel. Their weakness is undermining the democratic principles on which the EU was built</p><p>When Ursula von der Leyen made her pitch to become president of the European Commission back in 2019, she put the <em>“</em><a href="https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/SPEECH_19_4230">European way</a><em>”</em> at the heart of her appeal. Under her direction, she said, Europe would be a principled power built on multilateralism, fair trade and the rules-based order, standing firm and united against authoritarianism, protectionism and the politics of zero-sum thinking.</p><p>Six years on, she is again calling on Europe to “<a href="https://ec.europa.eu/commission/presscorner/detail/en/speech_25_2053">fight</a>” for that future. But the vision is fading fast. This summer brought a cascade of negative headlines decrying <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/698517e6-9955-4ae9-9a9f-b91202157571">Europe’s “humiliation”</a>; it was the worst in years, if not in a century, some critics said. All pointed to the same reality: European leaders, fearing both a trade war and the loss of US support for Ukraine, had bowed to the wishlist of the Trump administration and left their tariff-retaliation toolbox untouched. Τhey lavished the US president with praise and applauded an agreement that was anything but balanced. Dressed up as pragmatism, it felt like capitulation to many Europeans.</p><p>Thu Nguyen is deputy director of the Jacques Delors Centre at the Hertie School in Berlin<a href="https://www.delorscentre.eu/en/team/profile/person/nguyen">.</a> Jannik Jansen is a policy fellow at the same institute</p> <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2025/sep/24/europe-placating-far-right-trump">Conti