European elites have surely had their fill of US President Donald Trump and his dismissive attitude towards America’s traditional allies. The rise of an insurgent left within the Democratic Party might leave them wishing the MAGA right retains power.
Europeans are used to a Europhile Democratic establishment holding sway within America’s other major party. Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s active prioritisation of the war against Nazi Germany in the Second World War saved Western Europe from fascism and Communism, while his successor Harry Truman’s creation of the Marshall Plan and NATO laid the foundation for Western Europe’s rebirth.
Later Democratic presidents were also well regarded by European elites. John F. Kennedy’s elegant demeanour and Francophile wife captivated the continent, and Bill Clinton and Joe Biden were ardent Atlanticists. Barack Obama’s rapturous reception at the Victory Column and receipt of the Nobel Peace Prize demonstrated the Eurocrats’ relief that George W. Bush’s cowboy warrior ethic was on the way out.
There’s still a strong faction within the party that shares those traits. But this year’s election season has been marked by repeated victories by the party’s left wing. Self-described socialist Zohran Mamdani is New York City’s mayor, and several other socialists have been nominated in hard-fought elections to become the party’s nominees in the US House and Senate. For the first time in decades, Democratic Party elites face the prospect of losing control of America’s only major non-conservative party.
American politics are significantly more right-leaning than those in Europe, but these new insurgents have marked similarities to Europe’s leftist parties. Like Ireland’s Sinn Féin or France’s La France Insoumise, they are unrelentingly critical of economic neoliberalism. They embrace a highly progressive social agenda, promoting the woke cultural views that have shaken politics worldwide, and are unrelentingly favourable to dramatic and rapid action on climate change. The mixture of parties aligned with the Left or the Greens-EFA is broadly representative of the new Democratic Left.
The fact that these people are aligned with many leftist European sentiments does not mean, though, that they prioritise active military support of European security. While most, if not all, support aid for Ukraine, they tend to oppose the increased American military spending that would allow the United States to continue to play its global role.
Take New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Her surprise 2018 victory in a Democratic primary, unseating longtime congressman Joe Crowley, was the new left’s first major victory. She has rocketed to national stardom despite – or perhaps in part because of – her extreme youth. Still only 36 years old, she is one of the most popular national Democrats and is widely viewed as the left’s shot to finally wrestle the Democratic presidential nomination away from the elite cabal that has controlled it for so long.
Her performance at the Munich Security Conference on February 13 displayed a clear lack of familiarity with the nuances of the issues she would have to face as president. Her inability to offer a succinct answer to the obvious question of whether the United States would defend Taiwan if the island nation were attacked by Communist China was especially inadequate. Bromides about how income inequality purportedly drives people to embrace conservative populism, the theme of her main speech, cannot make up for the lack of serious view of the global geostrategic situation.
Her consistent opposition to American military spending should also worry Eurocrats. The annual American defence budget, known as the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), is widely viewed as a must-pass bill. While early versions always attract partisan disputes, final passage is usually a rare act of bipartisanship in the increasingly partisan Congress. Yet Ocasio-Cortez has voted against final passage of every NDAA since her election.
America cannot meet its treaty and implicit obligations without increasing spending on defence. Its weapons are ageing and need expensive replacement. The growing assertiveness of the authoritarian alliance (Russia, China, Iran and North Korea) also raises the number of active threats America’s global security structure might face in the near future. This means America’s military needs to grow in line with its allies’ commensurate growth. Yet Ocasio-Cortez seems blind to this obvious fact.
Her leftist allies often take stances even more hostile to European security. Many of these leftists, including Ocasio-Cortez, belong to the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA). The DSA platform, published on July 14, 2026, calls for the defunding of the Department of War and the closure of American military bases overseas. It says nothing about maintaining America’s alliances and ominously never mentions NATO.
Trump, in contrast, proposed increasing the defence budget to $1.5 trillion (€1.3 trillion) for fiscal year 2027, approximately 5 per cent of gross domestic product. He is certainly problematic on many issues of concern to Europe, but he also has not removed America from NATO and seems happy with the NATO allies’ progress on rearming. An uncertain friend who knows American military might is the backstop of global peace is surely preferable to a pollyannish, pacifistic movement that thinks the current global instability is the product of capitalism and American aggression.
It’s quite possible that the 2028 campaign will put Ocasio-Cortez against Vice President JD Vance. European elites will surely look at this choice in horror, but that simply tells them what time it really is: Time to rapidly rearm.
