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Over a twelve months after the vote that handed Donald Trump a decisive comeback victory, the Democratic party has still not issued its election autopsy. However, last week, an prominent progressive lobby group published its own. The Harris campaign, its writers argued, failed to connect with key voter blocs because it failed to concentrate enough on tackling basic economic anxieties. By prioritising the menace to democracy that Maga authoritarianism represented, liberals neglected the bread-and-butter issues that were uppermost in many people’s minds.

A Warning for European Capitals

While Europe prepares for a tumultuous period of politics from now until the end of the decade, that is a message that must be fully understood in European capitals. The White House, as its recently published national security strategy makes clear, is optimistic that “nationalist movements in Europe will quickly replicate Mr Trump’s success. In the EU’s core nations, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) and Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) top the polls, backed by large swaths of blue-collar voters. But among establishment politicians and parties, it is difficult to see a response that is adequate to troubling times.

Major Problems and Costly Solutions

The challenges Europe faces are costly and historic. They include the war in Ukraine, maintaining the momentum of the green transition, dealing with demographic change and building economies that are more resilient to pressure by Mr Trump and China. As per a Brussels-based research institute, the new age of global instability could require an additional €250bn in annual EU defence spending. A major report last year on European economic competitiveness demanded substantial investment in public goods, to be partly funded by jointly held EU debt.

Such a fiscal paradigm shift would boost growth figures that have flatlined for years.

But, at both the EU-wide and national levels, there continues to be a deficit of courage when it comes to revenue raising. The EU’s so-called “budget hawks oppose the idea of collective borrowing, and EU spending plans for the next seven years are deeply timid. In France, the idea of a tax on the super-rich is widely supported with voters. Yet the beleaguered 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 austerity budgets and increased inequality. Acrimonious recent conflicts over pension cutbacks in both France and Germany testify to a developing struggle over the future of the European social model – a phenomenon that the RN and the AfD have happily exploited 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 said that it would target any benefit cuts at foreign residents.

Preventing a Political Gift for Populists

Across the Atlantic, Mr Trump’s promises to protect blue‑collar interests were largely insincere, as subsequent healthcare reductions and fiscal benefits for the wealthy demonstrated. But in the absence of a compelling progressive counteroffer from the Harris campaign, they proved effective on the election circuit. Absent a fundamental change in economic approach, social contracts across the continent risk being torn apart. Policymakers must avoid handing this electoral boon to the populist movements already on the rise in Europe.