Europe’s hard right – united behind Marine Le Pen, but mute about Trump’s trade war

In an interview with The Conversation, Luc Rouban considers that the Paris court ruling against Marine Le Pen “represents an effort to make democracy better. Reaffirming the rule of law is absolutely essential and legitimate.” In the view of this French political scientist, who is research director of France’s prestigious Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, French democracy is “very fragile”, “much more so than in other European countries”:

“[T]he level of public confidence in the political class and in the justice system is very low [in France], and needs to be restored. One way of doing this is to ensure that justice is applied to public figures who embezzle millions of euros, and not just to supermarket cashiers who are fired and prosecuted for stealing a chocolate bar. Marine Le Pen's conviction is undeniable progress for our democracy: it's a sign that the relationship with politics is changing, that politics has become a professional activity like any other, subject to regulations and laws.”

Contrary to the “the Trumpist argument of ‘government by judges’”, Rouban observes that “judges are simply applying the law”.

In his “History of the Present” newsletter on Substack, Timothy Garton Ash nevertheless worries about the political consequences of Marine Le Pen's conviction. In particular, the British historian and essayist sees two great dangers. Firstly, it might actually help Marine Le Pen’s RN win the 2027 presidential election, either with Le Pen herself as the candidate, should her conviction subsequently be overturned, or with the RN's official leader Jordan Bardella.

Here, “TGA” cites the Romanian precedent, where another hard-right candidate, George Simion, seems to be benefitting from the ban of pro-Russian candidate Călin Georgescu. Similarly, Donald Trump's own election was “helped rather than hindered by his criminal convictions, which he decried as political justice”.

This hints at the second danger, as Timothy Garton Ash sees it: “What is, in the French case, almost certainly an example of the impartiality of the rule of law may end up undermining popular belief in the impartiality of the rule of law, at least in a significant chunk of the electorate.”

He points to an opinion poll which found that more than 40% of French people thought Mrs Le Pen's verdict had been influenced by political considerations.

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In Deník Referendum, Petr Janyška is unsurprised at the immediate outcome of Le Pen’s conviction: “The far right unleashed a veritable media tsunami, calling the judgement a ‘scandal of democracy’, a ‘dark day for French democracy’, ‘practices worthy of a totalitarian regime’ and a political trial aimed at blocking their candidate's path to the Elysée Palace.”

Janyška, a former diplomat and Czech ambassador to France, is despondent: “Suddenly, we understand how the far right imagines the role of justice and its impartiality. [...] It's like listening to Trump.” He points out that, in effect, “those who reject the judgement because it concerns [Le Pen's] political identity are saying that she should be judged using different criteria to other people”.

In Valigia Blu, Matteo Pascoletti writes that Marine Le Pen’s condemnation has been a perfect opportunity for Donald Trump to vituperate about “a new ‘witch-hunt’ by the ‘European left against freedom of expression’.” Trump’s accusation is a cynical one, in Pascoletti’s reading:

“[It was] a brutal intervention that twists the case to its own anti-European propaganda. [...] Around this narrative, which combines victimization, intimidation and contempt for the rule of law, there is a broad bipartisan spectrum of those who, although they may not be seeking to kill the rule of law, are at least trying to provoke its suicide.”

Pascoletti notes that while the “reactionary international” has been quick to brand Marine Le Pen a martyr, a number of voices on Europe's left are also upset about “government by judges”. Yet:

“There is no real logic in some of the rhetoric, other than the implicit acceptance of a type of power based on privilege and exceptions. For either we believe in the rule of law, and so embrace it as a social contract to be reckoned with, or we decide that it is an illusion and that the contract might as well be used as toilet paper. In the first case, the judiciary doesn't have to take into account the popular vote, let alone opinion polls, nor does it derive its legitimacy from them.”

Trump's support for the RN leader, along with that of his vice-president J D Vance, came right after the American president's “Liberation Day”, when he announced massive new tariffs on almost every country in the world, with the notable exception of Russia. The tariffs included 20% for the European Union.

The rise of Europe's far-right parties had seemed inescapable, but Trump's move might well deal them a blow, in addition to slowing the economy. “The good news is that Trump's trade war puts far-right forces sympathetic to him in a terribly uncomfortable position“, says Nathalie Tocci, an Italian political scientist, in The Guardian:

“It's one thing for the European far right to support Trump on principle, or to support the US administration's tyranny over peoples it cares little about, whether Ukrainians, Canadians, Mexicans or Palestinians. It's quite another to defend Trump and his policies when the victims are countries that these far-right parties are supposed to represent.”

Nathalie Tocci points to the dilemma facing hard-right leaders, who know that they risk being “punished if they speak out in favor of Trump, and punished if they don't.” And she points to a potential political benefit of Trump’s trade war against Europe:

“It could strengthen [European] unity. This effect is already visible. Caught between Russia's war and America's betrayal, Europeans have rediscovered their support for the EU. The latest Eurobarometer reveals that 74% of Europeans think their country's membership of the EU is a good thing. It’s the highest figure in 42 years.”