Geopolitics: The Paradoxical Influence of Donald Trump on European Right

There is an old epistemological debate: can we really formulate laws, stable principles to understand politics? There are multiple answers and multiple schools of thought. I particularly like the one proposed by Italian political scientists who assert, with a certain elegance, that there are no rules in politics – but there are regularities.

And for the past few months, there is one that is becoming difficult to ignore. So, this morning, almost solemnly, I suggest giving it a name: the Trump Effect.

Definition: in a political trajectory within a known field – the Trump Effect signifies an increase in intensity such that it causes a non-linear and potentially catastrophic transformation of this political trajectory and the field itself.

An example will make things much clearer.

Giorgia Meloni had decided to align herself with Trump. She spoke at the big MAGA rallies, went to Mar-a-Lago even before her inauguration – she even asked Donald Trump Junior to write the preface for her book in English titled I AM GIORGIA.

Her gamble was simple: becoming, through ideological proximity, the conduit of Europe with the new White House.

However, the political cost of this positioning has become untenable. Despite good polls and unprecedented governmental stability, Meloni significantly lost her constitutional referendum a month ago.

Since then, under internal pressure, she has been making U-turns.

On Iran, on Israel, she finds herself today – paradoxically – closer to the socialist Pedro Sánchez – who has since become the preferred figure of the Italians – than to the White House.

In fact, this week the American president himself realized this and attacked Meloni for the first time, saying he was “shocked”.

And here, another paradox appears: these attacks – coming from the one she had presented as her greatest ally – do not weaken her, but strengthen her.

Because Trump is not a normal political figure. His impact is less like that of a foreign head of state and more like a media machine: he is everywhere, on our screens, in our conversations.

He creates “a new geopolitical divide” – in the words of Jean-Yves Dormagen in the Grand Continent – ending up politicizing even those who are not interested in politics.

So let’s be clear: the populist crisis has not disappeared. Its underlying reasons are still there – sometimes even stronger.

But Donald Trump’s second term produces an unexpected effect with regularity: it becomes an electoral hindrance for his own allies in Europe.

Instead of accelerating the real dynamics of the far right, the American president complicates it. We see it in Italy – we saw it in Hungary, where the Trump effect contributed to Viktor Orbán’s defeat after 16 years of dominance.