Trump is abandoning democracy and freedom. That creates an opening for Europe – and Britain

The Guardian

21-03-2025

Thanks to Donald Trump, a vacancy is opening up in the international jobs market. For decades, if not centuries, and always imperfectly, the US offered itself to the world as the guarantor of democracy and the land of the free. Now that it's pivoting away from that job description, there's an opportunity for someone else to step in.
The evidence that the US is moving, even galloping, away from basic notions of democracy and freedom is piling up. Just because the changes have happened so fast doesn't make them any less fundamental. We now have a US administration that blithely ignores court rulings, whose officials say out loud 'I don't care what the judges think'. In a matter of weeks, it has become an open question whether the US remains a society governed by the rule of law.
In the name of defeating 'woke' and diversity, equity and inclusion, or DEI, even historic efforts to advance civil rights are disdained or banished into the memory hole: this week it emerged that an army webpage celebrating Harry Truman's 1948 order to integrate the military had disappeared, along with several others honouring distinguished Black soldiers. When asked about it, the press secretary at the Pentagon said: 'DEI is dead at the defense department.' As for the Department of Education, this week Trump moved to abolish it altogether.
But if the US is being upended by the Trump hurricane, so is everywhere else in its path, including those places that once looked to the US with admiration. We can all see the coercion of Ukraine into accepting a supposed peace that will require it to surrender its territory to Vladimir Putin and its minerals to Trump. Less visible is the way in which the scything of the US federal government by Trump and Elon Musk is aiding Putin's assault on Ukraine's most vulnerable people – its children.
Among the US projects cut is a state department initiative to collect evidence of Russian war crimes, including the abduction of more than 20,000 Ukrainian children, many of them sent to Russia for forced adoption. Now there are fears that that information, which might have helped find the children and eventually reunite them with their parents, has been lost, destroyed by the Musk chainsaw. Captain America thought he was a superhero; turns out he's the villain's accomplice.
Now it is those contemptuous of democracy who look to the US for inspiration. This week, Benjamin Netanyahu broke a ceasefire he had agreed with Hamas, resuming devastating airstrikes on Gaza, killing hundreds of Palestinians, in part because he doubtless presumed Trump would give him no grief. But he also sacked the independent-minded head of Israel's domestic intelligence agency, the Shin Bet, the latest move in his ongoing attempt to remove every legal or constitutional constraint on his power. If that reminds you of someone, there's good reason. 'In America and in Israel, when a strong rightwing leader wins an election, the leftist Deep State weaponizes the justice system to thwart the people's will,' Netanyahu tweeted on Wednesday. 'They won't win in either place! We stand strong together.' Trump's authoritarian power grab is providing cover for others to do the same.
This new role for the US, as a beacon of anti-democracy, is having some unintended consequences. Canada was on course to elect a Conservative government; now, by way of a backlash, the Liberals under Mark Carney look set to ride an anti-Trump wave to victory. However it operates, Trumpism is becoming a key determinant of politics the world over.
Perhaps especially in Britain. For most of the last century, the US has been Britain's foremost ally. Put more baldly, London has all but relied on Washington for its own defence. Britain's military and intelligence systems are intricately integrated with those of the US; its nuclear capability is not operationally independent. These last two months, it has become obvious that that is no longer sustainable: Britain cannot rely on a US that behaves more like an enemy than a friend.
That, in turn, creates a new political fact – we are in an age of rearmament – that will be the organising principle of Rachel Reeves's spring statement next week. It will require either deep cuts or new taxes. Trump has scrambled Britain's finances.
By itself, that represents a monumental change. But it won't end there. Almost everything we do will need to be rethought. Much of that is cause for alarm – how can Nato function when its mightiest member has become an adversary? – but it also creates opportunities for Britain, if we are only willing to seize them.
Take, as just one example, Trump's war on science. The US has long been the world leader in almost every field of research. But Trump and Musk are slashing or closing one research hub after another, whether at the National Institutes of Health or the Environmental Protection Agency, which could lay off thousands of talented scientists. The administration is threatening academic freedom, forcing US universities to bend to Trumpism or lose funding. This week, a French scientist travelling to the US for a conference was denied entry because, according to the French government, his 'phone contained exchanges with colleagues and friends in which he expressed a personal opinion on the Trump administration's research policy'. You read that right: the man was subjected to a random check at the airport, US officials went through his laptop and phone, found private messages speaking ill of the president and sent him back home.
This is an opening for Britain, which should be promoting itself as a haven for free, unhindered scientific inquiry. The EU has already spotted the chance, and is devising a plan to lure US scholars. But the UK has the advantage of the English language; it should be first in line. Some see the opportunity, but sadly the UK government is not among them: petitioned to reduce upfront visa costs for overseas scientists, which is an average of 17 times higher than for comparable countries, ministers this week said no.
But science is only one area where Britain could be taking up the slack. Trump is silencing the Voice of America and Radio Free Europe: the BBC should be given the relatively modest funds required to step in and do the job instead, thereby boosting British soft power at a stroke.
The first step is understanding that the world has changed and that the old shibboleths no longer apply. It's absurd that Britain, home to Europe's biggest arms industry, is, thanks to Brexit, shut out of the new €150bn (£125bn) EU defence procurement fund, the latest example of how standing apart from its neighbours amounts to reckless folly in the Trump era.
What the moment calls for is great boldness. It means Keir Starmer having the courage to tell the country that everything has changed and that we will have to change, too. Yes, that will involve painful sacrifices to pay for rearmament, and the breaking of political taboos, including listening to the majority of Britons who tell pollsters it's time we rejoined the EU.
It adds up to a vision of a Europe that includes Britain, stepping into the space the US is vacating, guaranteeing and promoting free speech and democratic accountability at the very moment the US is abandoning those ideals. Trump has blasted the door open. All we have to do is walk through it.
On 30 April, join Jonathan Freedland, Kim Darroch, Devika Bhat and Leslie Vinjamuri as they discuss Trump's presidency on his 100th day in office, live at Conway Hall London, and live streamed globally. You can book tickets here
Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist