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More than a year after the election that handed Donald Trump a decisive return victory, the Democratic Party has yet to released its election autopsy. But, recently, an prominent liberal advocacy organization released its own. The Harris campaign, its authors contended, did not resonate with key voter blocs because it did not focus enough on tackling basic economic anxieties. In focusing on the menace to democracy that Maga authoritarianism represented, liberals overlooked the kitchen-table concerns that were uppermost in many people’s minds.

A Lesson for Europe

As the EU braces for a turbulent era of politics from now until the end of the decade, that is a message that needs to be fully absorbed in European capitals. The White House, as its recently published national security strategy indicates, is hopeful that “nationalist movements in Europe will soon replicate Mr Trump’s success. Within Europe's core nations, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) and Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) lead the polls, supported by significant segments of working-class voters. But among establishment politicians and parties, it is hard to discern a strategy that is sufficient to challenging times.

Major Challenges and Expensive Solutions

The challenges Europe faces are expensive and era-defining. They encompass the war in Ukraine, sustaining the momentum of the green transition, dealing with demographic change and building economies that are less vulnerable to bullying by Mr Trump and China. According to a European thinktank, the new age of global instability could necessitate an additional €250bn in yearly EU defence spending. A significant report last year on European economic competitiveness demanded substantial investment in shared infrastructure, to be partly funded by jointly held EU debt.

Such a economic transformation would boost growth figures that have stagnated for years.

However, at both the pan-European and national levels, there continues to be a lack of boldness when it comes to generating funds. The EU’s so-called “frugal” nations oppose the idea of collective borrowing, and Brussels’ budget proposals for the next seven years are deeply unambitious. In France, the idea of a tax on the super-rich is overwhelmingly popular with voters. Yet the embattled centrist government – though desperate to cut its budget deficit – will not consider such a move.

The Price of Political Paralysis

The truth is that in the absence of such measures, the less affluent will pay the price of fiscal tightening through spending cuts and increased inequality. Bitter recent conflicts over retirement reforms in both France and Germany highlight a developing struggle over the future of the European social model – a phenomenon that the RN and the AfD have eagerly leveraged to promote a politics of nativist social policy. Ms Le Pen’s party, for example, has resisted moves to raise the retirement age and has stated that it would focus any benefit cuts at non-French nationals.

Preventing a Strategic Advantage for Nationalists

Across the Atlantic, Mr Trump’s pledges to protect blue‑collar interests were largely insincere, as later healthcare reductions and tax breaks for the wealthy underlined. Yet in the absence of a compelling progressive alternative from the Harris campaign, they worked on the election circuit. Without a radical shift in fiscal policy, social contracts across the continent risk being ripped up. Governments must steer clear of giving this electoral boon to the Trumpian forces already on the rise in Europe.