As the Iran war that began with U.S.-Israeli airstrikes drags on, major right-wing parties in Europe that had supported President Donald Trump are moving to distance themselves from Trump.
According to the Financial Times (FT) in the U.K. on the 12th, Nigel Farage, leader of Reform UK ahead of next month's local elections, said of his relationship with Trump, "I know him, but it's not an important issue," adding, "Whether Joe Biden is in the White House or Trump is, the bilateral relationship is the most important relationship in the world."
As recently as last year, Farage emphasized his close ties with Trump, saying he wanted to become prime minister quickly while Trump was in office. But as the number of voters critical of Trump increases, he appears increasingly inclined to hide his closeness to Trump.
According to pollster YouGov, among Reform UK supporters in the U.K., those who answered that "the United States has a negative impact on the world" rose from 26% in January this year to 35% last month, signaling that anti-Trump sentiment is strengthening among British voters.
Kemi Badenoch, leader of the center-right Conservative Party in the U.K., also recently called Trump "childish" for repeatedly criticizing Prime Minister Keir Starmer on the grounds that the U.K. was passive in supporting U.S. forces. In February last year, she had given a positive assessment of Trump's potential return to the White House, saying it shows that "there are cases where you identify the problems in a first term and come to know the real solutions in a second term."
The U.K. is one of Europe's key U.S. allies, and hardline conservatives had long kept close to Trump. But after Trump imposed a high tariff on the U.K. last year and then played down the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, where large numbers of British troops were deployed, support for Trump within the right wing has weakened, the FT reported.
Criticism of Trump is also emerging among right-wing politicians in other European countries. Marine Le Pen, floor leader and member of the National Rally (RN) in France and a leading far-right politician, said in an interview with the French daily Le Parisien earlier this month, "Trump failed to fully grasp the ripple effects of intervening in Iran," adding, "It is becoming increasingly clear that there was little advance preparation."
She continued, "This attack appears to have been carried out blindly," stressing that France should not respond to Trump's call to join the war. In an interview with Radio France Inter, she also criticized Trump's "capricious war aims" and said the Iran attack was a "mistake." As recently as Feb. 28, the first day the Iran war broke out, Le Pen had said, "I support the U.S. and Israeli attack on Iran."
Moves to distance from Trump are also being detected in Germany. Earlier, the FT reported on the 3rd that the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) recently issued guidance asking its lawmakers to refrain from U.S. trips to build ties with Trump's MAGA faction. Tino Chrupalla, the hard-right AfD co-leader, also said on the 28th of last month that he was "deeply disappointed" with Trump's prosecution of the Iran war.
As European voters' anti-Trump leanings grow stronger, conservative parties' "distancing from Trump" is likely to deepen. Viktor Orban, long seen as an icon of Europe's far right, lost in the general election that day and will step down as prime minister after 16 years. Trump dispatched Vice President JD Vance to Hungary in the final stretch of the campaign to support Orban, but ultimately failed to keep him in power.
ABC in the United States said, "Orban's defeat will have considerable repercussions in the U.S.," adding, "The Iran war shows that Trump's ability to support allied politicians overseas has been weakened."