Europe's far right distances itself from Trump, blaming Iran war for Republican midterm defeat
Far-right leaders in France, Germany, Italy and Britain have begun to put distance between themselves and Donald Trump after the Democrats' midterm sweep, blaming the war with Iran and the cost of living for the Republican defeat.
Europe's far-right leaders have begun to distance themselves from Donald Trump in the wake of the Democrats' sweeping victory in the United States midterm elections, while mostly stopping short of criticising the president by name. The shift, reported by Reuters on Wednesday, is striking because many of the same politicians celebrated their ideological closeness to Trump after his return to the White House in 2024, with some visiting Washington and welcoming support from his allies.
The immediate trigger is the scale of the Republican defeat. Democrats captured both houses of Congress on Tuesday, flipping Senate seats in states long considered Republican strongholds and building a House majority, in a result widely read as a rebuke of Trump's handling of the economy and of the war with Iran that began earlier this year. Trump himself has acknowledged that the Iran war played a role in his party's losses, while insisting he stands by the decision to launch it.
Jordan Bardella, leader of France's National Rally, which most polls suggest could form the next French government, set the tone for the European reaction. He said the verdict of the ballot box had to be respected, noting that midterm elections are almost always unfavourable to an incumbent president. But he drew a sharp contrast between Trump's first term, when he said the ambition was to pull the United States out of major conflicts, and his second term, which he described as markedly different in philosophy and foreign policy.
Bardella argued that American intervention over Iran carries very heavy consequences, not only for the United States economy but also for Europe's, because higher oil prices squeeze the purchasing power of ordinary citizens. That economic argument ran through much of the European response: the war has pushed up energy costs, disrupted shipping through the Strait of Hormuz and fed the cost-of-living pressures that incumbent governments everywhere are struggling to contain.
In Germany, Alice Weidel, co-leader of the Alternative for Germany, was blunter about the political cause. She told the German online outlet T-Online that Trump had promised his voters not to pursue an interventionist foreign policy, and that this broken promise had now come back to haunt the Republicans. Her party, like Bardella's, had previously been happy to be associated with Trump's movement; the midterm result has made that association look like a liability rather than an asset.
Italy's far right struck a more cautious note. Matteo Salvini, leader of the League and a member of Italy's governing coalition, said democracy works and that when a people vote, their vote must be respected and understood. Roberto Vannacci, a former general who leads the Futuro Nazionale party, went further, saying the American result showed the dangers of failing to deliver on electoral promises and arguing that Trump had failed to live up to expectations, had not ended the war between Russia and Ukraine, and had launched a war against Iran.
In Britain, Rupert Lowe, leader of the Restore Britain party, also blamed the decision to attack Iran for the Republican defeat. The pattern across the continent is therefore consistent even where the language differs: the Iran war, and the economic pain attached to it, is being named as the reason voters turned away, while direct personal criticism of Trump himself remains rare.
Political analysts quoted in the coverage described the distancing as an obvious piece of political calculation. Mujtaba Rahman, managing director of the political risk consultancy Eurasia Group, said Europe's far-right leaders were moving away from Trump for clear electoral advantage, because ties that once signalled strength could now become an electoral liability at home. The leaders involved face their own elections in the coming years and do not want to be defined by another country's unpopular war.
The reaction also reflects a wider global reassessment of the midterm result. Governments and politicians around the world have weighed what a Democratic Congress means for trade, security and energy prices, with European lawmakers hoping for greater predictability on Ukraine and NATO, while warning that American protectionism will not simply disappear because control of Congress has changed hands. Iran's leaders, meanwhile, have presented the result as a rejection of war by American voters.
What happens next will test whether this distancing is a lasting break or a temporary repositioning. If the far-right parties continue to frame Trump as a cautionary example, it could reshape the transatlantic populist alliance that defined much of the last two years. If, instead, they quietly return to praising him once the midterm shock fades, Wednesday's comments will look like little more than damage control. For now, the message from Europe's far right is unmistakable: the American result has changed the political arithmetic, and nobody on that side of the Atlantic wants to be seen standing too close to a losing war.
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