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More than a twelve months following the vote that delivered Donald Trump a decisive comeback victory, the Democratic Party has yet to issued its election autopsy. However, last week, an influential liberal advocacy organization published its own. Kamala Harris's campaign, its writers contended, did not resonate with key voter blocs because it failed to concentrate enough on tackling basic economic anxieties. In focusing on the menace to democracy that Maga authoritarianism represented, liberals neglected the bread-and-butter issues that were foremost in many people’s minds.

A Warning for Europe

While Europe prepares for a turbulent era of politics between now and the end of the decade, that is a message that must be fully absorbed in European capitals. The White House, as its newly released national security strategy makes clear, is hopeful that “nationalist movements in Europe will quickly replicate Mr Trump’s success. Within Europe's Franco-German engine room, Marine Le Pen’s National Rally (RN) and Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) top the polls, backed by large swaths of working-class voters. Yet among establishment politicians and parties, it is hard to discern a response that is sufficient to troubling times.

Major Challenges and Costly Solutions

The challenges Europe faces are expensive and historic. They encompass the war in Ukraine, maintaining the momentum of the green transition, dealing with demographic change and building economies that are more resilient to bullying by Mr Trump and China. As per a Brussels-based research institute, the new age of geopolitical insecurity could necessitate an additional €250bn in annual EU defence spending. A significant study last year on European economic competitiveness demanded massive investment in public goods, to be partly funded by collective EU debt.

Such a fiscal paradigm shift would stimulate growth figures that have stagnated for years.

However, at both the EU-wide and national levels, there remains a deficit of courage when it comes to revenue raising. The EU’s so-called “frugal” nations resist the idea of collective borrowing, and Brussels’ budget proposals for the next seven years are profoundly timid. In France, the idea of a tax on the super-rich is overwhelmingly popular with voters. But the embattled centrist government – while desperate to cut its budget deficit – refuses to contemplate such a move.

The Price of Political Paralysis

The truth is that without such measures, the less well-off will pay the price of fiscal tightening through austerity budgets and increased inequality. Bitter recent conflicts over retirement reforms in both France and Germany testify to a growing battle over the future of the European welfare state – a trend that the RN and the AfD have eagerly leveraged to promote a politics of welfare chauvinism. Ms Le Pen’s party, for example, has opposed moves to raise the retirement age and has said that it would target any benefit cuts at foreign residents.

Preventing a Political Gift for Nationalists

Across the Atlantic, Mr Trump’s promises to protect blue‑collar interests were deeply disingenuous, as subsequent Medicaid cuts and tax breaks for the wealthy demonstrated. But in the absence of a compelling progressive alternative from the Harris campaign, they proved effective on the election circuit. Without a radical shift in fiscal policy, societal agreements across the continent are in danger of being torn apart. Governments must steer clear of giving this electoral boon to the Trumpian forces already on the march in Europe.