Why Do MAGA Republicans Hate Europe?

In May 1988, Republican President Ronald Reagan spoke from the Oval Office in an address not targeted at the American people, but the citizens of Western Europe. The president was planning a trip to meet with Soviet Union General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev and wanted to make his commitment to Europe clear.

Staring directly at the camera, Reagan said: "Shared [moral] standards and beliefs tie us to Europe today. They are the essence of the community of free nations to which we belong."

Thirty years later, in July 2018, while sitting for an interview with CBS at his Turnberry golf resort in Scotland, Republican President Donald Trump was asked to name America's top global foe. "Well, I think we have a lot of foes," Trump said. "I think the European Union is a foe, what they do to us in trade. Now you wouldn't think of the European Union, but they're a foe." He followed by raising concerns about Russia and China as well.

Trump's comments reflected a decaying relationship between Europe and the GOP that has largely worsened in the years since. Just 43 percent of Republicans agreed that the U.S. should take into account the defense interests of other countries, according to a 2024 Pew Research Center report—a 6 percentage point drop from where that total stood in 2023.

In a private group chat of Trump officials made public by The Atlantic, Vice President JD Vance reportedly raised concerns about engaging in a military strike on Houthi terrorists in Yemen to secure the Red Sea shipping lanes on the grounds that "I just hate bailing out the Europeans again."

To that, the report claimed Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth responded by emphasizing his belief that the strike furthers U.S. interests but agreed that "I fully share your loathing of European freeloading."

The idea of Western Europe operating as a wealthy free rider of the U.S. defense apparatus has proliferated within the GOP since Russian President Vladimir Putin's 2022 invasion of Ukraine. Reagan-era conservatives like former Republican Senate Leader Mitch McConnell have steadfastly defended America's $183 billion investment in defending Ukraine. However, others in the party, like Vance, have called on Western Europe to take the lead so America can divert its attention elsewhere.

While this matter has stood at the center of America's relationship with Europe for much of the past three years, other ideological, cultural and historic trends have each played a part in changing the relationship from the cozy days of Reagan to the icy atmosphere under Trump. It remains to be seen how much of this changing relationship reflects a new defense strategy versus retaliation for the widening cultural gaps between the GOP and Western Europe.

"I do think it is obvious that there is a part of the Republican Party, or a group within the Republican Party, that sees a kindred spirit in Putin as a defender of traditional values," James M. Lindsay, a distinguished senior fellow at the nonpartisan Council on Foreign Relations and former director for global issues and multilateral affairs at the National Security Council, told Newsweek. "I think you can find some of those appeals in American politics as well."

The contrast between Putin's social conservatism and Western Europe's progressive orientation plays a role in shaping the GOP's outlook toward the continent. Europe, as a whole, has become more secular, socially progressive and vocally hostile toward conservative ideology. Such trends are magnified by the distancing cultural links between America and Western Europe that existed in past decades when emigration from the latter countries to the former was more prevalent.

Yet Lindsay states these are far from the only factors fraying the current relationship. Divides between Republican and Western European interests possess roots predating Trump, Reagan and the post-World War II global order.

A History of Distrust

There's always been a segment of the American public, within both parties, that is skeptical of internationalism—the principle advocating for economic and political cooperation between states, Lindsay noted. That was on display prior to World War I when President Woodrow Wilson oriented his 1916 reelection campaign around the slogan "He Kept Us Out of War," despite ultimately getting involved. The aftermath of that effort saw Senate Republicans retaliate by preventing America from joining Wilson's League of Nations and their candidate, Warren G. Harding, ascending to the presidency following Wilson's second term.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt privately wanted to support the United Kingdom and its democratic allies in their war against the Nazis and their Axis allies, but the politics around involvement would not turn his way until the December 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor. Even after the war, Republican Senator Robert A. Taft of Ohio—the then-chair of the Senate Republican Policy Committee and an outspoken noninterventionist—opposed America's full entry into the United Nations and the formation of NATO.

However, he was thwarted by Republican Senator Arthur Vandenberg of Michigan, a former noninterventionist and chair of the Foreign Relations Committee, who supported the idea that "politics stops at the water's edge" and backed Democratic President Harry Truman's internationalist efforts. Taft was further thwarted by his party in 1952 when GOP internationalists blocked his presidential candidacy at the Republican National Convention, paving the way for the presidency of former General Dwight D. Eisenhower, an internationalist moderate.

The coalition that elected Eisenhower in the 1952 primary was concentrated along the east and west coasts while Taft largely carried the Midwest and Northwest, with the two splitting the South. This paradigm largely represents the regional dynamics of internationalism and isolationism that can still be seen in the U.S. today. While conservative leaders who oppose aiding Europe, like Vance and Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky, come from areas in the center of the country, internationalists like former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley of South Carolina and Senate Armed Services Committee Chairman Roger Wicker of Mississippi come from states situated along the Atlantic Ocean.

The same can be seen in Eisenhower's former Vice President Richard Nixon of California, an anti-communist hawk who became president in 1969 and oversaw the diplomatically successful policy of détente. With the aid of Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, Nixon's policy of détente saw America deliver a critical blow to the Soviet Union by opening diplomatic relations with communist China. Democratic President Jimmy Carter would attempt to continue détente, yet his handling of the 1979 Iran Hostage Crisis would open him to criticism of portraying American weakness on the world stage, paving way for Reagan's "peace through strength" approach that would largely guide the GOP to this day.

A Post-Cold War Chill

Robert Y. Shapiro, a political science professor at Columbia University and president of the Academy of Political Science, attributes some of America's defense posture toward Europe to the sentiments being seen in the GOP today. The GOP has become more reliant on middle America and less aligned with the coasts under Trump. With less concern toward Cold War defense and a greater focus on cultural values, Shapiro noted that the continuation of "peace through strength" policies past the Cold War have provided Trump and his supporters with ammunition to criticize European governance.

"Trump and so forth would simply say: 'What happened at the end of the Cold War is the Europeans basically became free riders on the United States in terms of their defense and were devoting their resources to their welfare states,'" Shapiro told Newsweek. "It's not that the Europeans didn't have money, but the Europeans were choosing to spend money on other things."

The European Union's military spending as a percentage of GDP has been declining since the early 1960s, according to the World Bank. However, the starkest drop—from 2.6 percent to 1.3 percent—occurred between 1987 to 2014, with the figure only beginning to increase in 2019. America also began spending less between 1986 and 2001, yet after the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the figure climbed from 3.1 percent to 4.9 percent in 2010, since dropping to 3.4 percent.

Shapiro said Trump has utilized this fact to support his belief in diverting resources away from Europe, creating partisan divisions in the process. He points to the results of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs' 2024 Survey of American Public Opinion and U.S. Foreign Policy as evidence. In 2022, the survey found 80 percent of Republicans supported sending military assistance to Ukraine—a strategic priority for Europe—but as of 2024, that support figure has fallen to 45 percent.

"That's clearly Trump," Shapiro said. "You have a case here of what political scientists refer to as 'follow the leader,' as basically follow the partisan leader, with Republicans following Donald Trump almost in lockstep."

Shapiro sees Trump as the primary conduit toward the GOP's reorientation toward Europe. As do Lindsay and European Council on Foreign Relations Research Director Jeremy Shapiro (no relation to Robert), who previously served as special adviser to the assistant secretary of state for Europe and Eurasia at the U.S. Department of State. He said there's a view in the Republican Party that European leaders serve as part of a "liberal edifice"—often thought by Republicans to include bureaucrats, universities, and the media—that opposed Trump's agenda in his first term.

Whereas Reagan saw European allies as a critical partner in countering the Soviets, Shapiro notes that the Trump administration views them as far less important, as evidenced by Vance's comments. To make the matter worse for the European Union, Shapiro said its governance structure and way of working together often lends itself to the subservient position the GOP believes it occupies.

He said there's a mix of views in Europe regarding its unity. While some would like to see a more autonomous Europe, others are inclined to prioritize the U.S. relationship at all costs. This dispute came to play in 1956 amid the Suez Crisis, which Shapiro said "was a real shot across the bow of European independence, which arguably they've never recovered from."

Europe's Fractured Strategy

In 1956, Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser, nationalized the Suez Canal, which was previously controlled by the Suez Canal Company, which in turn was controlled by France and Britain. Fearing shipping routes through the Red Sea would be cut off, Britain and France secretly planned military action in alliance with Israel against Egypt. President Eisenhower, fearing Egypt would drift toward the Soviets, supported Nasser and pressured his allies to back down, allowing Egypt to maintain control of the canal and diminishing British and French influence in the Middle East.

After this, Shapiro said both nations recognized the extent of American power. The British elected to prevent a future crisis by more intently aligning their interests with America's, while the French took the opposite approach by taking steps toward increasing their independence. However, Shapiro said most other countries followed the British strategy, including Germany, which would be the most central player in bringing forth an autonomous Europe.

German leadership has begun to speak more critically of the U.S. under Trump, yet Shapiro said European autonomy remains an uphill challenge following decades of acquiescence. Much of the EU is economically intertwined with America, and France stands as the only EU country with an independent nuclear force. It remains to be seen whether European nations can overcome their independent interests and cultural differences to align as one.

"Dividing and conquering the EU is an old American tradition," Shapiro told Newsweek. "When I was in the State Department, we would do it two or three times before lunch. So the technique isn't exactly new, but I do think that the Trump administration is using it for different things and maybe even more often."

Given the Trump administration's perception of the EU and its leaders as a fixture of the "liberal edifice," it is possible hostilities with the region may be on track to worsen. Shapiro noted that Trump has long admired Putin as a "strongman" with the power to execute many social policies the GOP admires. He speculates that Trump may see Putin as "more of a kindred spirit in that regard, far more than any other European."

While Trump's posture toward Putin and attitude toward Russia may prove perplexing to Americans in both the Democratic and Republican parties, Lindsay said there could be a strategy at play that Trump could be emulating from the GOP of the old.

By pulling away from Europe, Trump could be incentivizing the bloc to up its defense spending, which would allow America to divert more of its resources toward countering China. In the process of speaking negatively of Europe and positively of Putin, Trump could be threatening years of peace and stability or priming America for a new era of great power competition with China by pulling off what Trump's supporters refer to as the "reverse Kissinger," whereby America improves diplomatic relations with Russia in a bid to isolate China. Lindsay is skeptical this can be achieved.

"There's a slight historical problem with that argument, which is that Donald Trump is trying to break a deepening relationship between Beijing and Moscow, and Nixon and Kissinger didn't engineer the split—they took advantage of a preexisting split [amid border tensions]," Lindsay said. "If Donald Trump is able to pry Russia apart from China and make Russia more sympathetic to U.S. interests, that would be a significant achievement, but the risk that Donald Trump faces is that Vladimir Putin will pocket whatever concessions are made by Donald Trump and continue his collaboration with China."

Editor's Note: This story was written under advisement of the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, where the author is working toward his Master of Arts.