The most obvious risk to this unit is Orbán, who will have a decisive role in the EU’s decision-making agenda in the second half of the year. Orbán, who visited Trump at his Florida residence last month, has long pushed for some form of peace deal for Ukraine. The Hungarian leader also hopes to benefit from increased support within the bloc after the expected rise of the far right in June’s European Parliament elections.
Orbán will likely be more emboldened, said Majda Ruge of the European Council on Foreign Relations. She stressed that the EU will need a strategy on how to “deal with spoilers”.
But Orbán could also prove to be the least of the continent’s problems. Although it has become a cliché in European politics to say that the bloc comes together in a crisis, the truth is that European leaders struggle to work together even in the best of times. Doing so while the region’s historic protector has not only withdrawn but is actively exerting pressure would pose an unprecedented challenge.
During his first term, Trump made a point of bypassing European institutions and speaking directly to national leaders. As uncertainty looms over European defense policy and Russia asserts its advantages in Ukraine, some countries, particularly those meeting their spending targets within NATO, could easily decide it is better get closer to the maverick American president rather than challenge him in Ukraine or elsewhere.
The question is to what extent some EU countries will be open to transactionalism with the United States, von Ondarza said. There are already well-known fault lines within the EU, on issues ranging from trade to energy production to foreign policy towards the Middle East or China. Trump could, for example, threaten to impose tariffs on targeted European products in order to pressure certain European capitals to follow his lead in Ukraine or elsewhere.
What Germany would do in such a scenario is an open question that worries some diplomats from other European countries. The same goes for Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. Meanwhile, Paris is already using the possibility of a Trump presidency to call for greater European autonomy, often in ways that benefit the French economy.
“The EU was united with the UK in the post-Brexit negotiations, but it took a huge amount of time and effort,” an EU official said. “This time, the stakes will be much higher and the pressure much greater. »
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