While on Wednesday Trump backtracked on his administration’s threats, saying he will not take Greenland by force and would suspend his tariff threats, powerful right-wing figures in the continent’s capitals and core EU institutions have already shifted their narrative to adapt to the transatlantic hostility, mimicking the centrist leaders they loathe and dialing up the rhetoric against American imperialism.
“I think we should be honest,” said Nicola Procaccini, the leader of the right-wing European Conservatives and Reformists group in the European Parliament, who is also Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s right-hand man in the chamber. “When Trump is wrong, we should say he’s wrong, when he’s right, we should say he is right.”
Jordan Bardella, president of France’s far-right National Rally, and Nigel Farage, the populist leader of Reform UK, condemned Trump’s escalating threats over Greenland and his use of tariffs as coercive leverage against the very countries they hope to govern. Both are wary of appearing too close to a figure increasingly viewed by public opinion, including their voters, as a hostile force.
Trump’s aggressive push on Greenland “goes way beyond a diplomatic disagreement,” Bardella said in the European Parliament on Tuesday, describing the U.S. president’s tariff threats as “blackmail” and accusing him of attempting the “vassalization” of Europe.
In the same address he called on the EU to activate its so-called trade bazooka, also known as the anti-coercion instrument, aligning with the position of his rival, President Emmanuel Macron. That puts Bardella at odds with a leader to whom he has long felt an affinity: Meloni, whose government is still advocating a let’s-keep-calm-and-negotiate approach.
Even the far-right Alternative for Germany, which once openly embraced support from the Trump administration, is scrambling to recalibrate.