After Donald Trump won the U.S. presidential election, he will find across the Atlantic a hotbed of political parties that share his conservative views mix of authoritarianism, populism and disdain for illegal immigration.
This is the rise of the European far right, which reached a high-water mark on 29 September when Austria’s Freedom Party won the largest share of votes — 28.9 percent — in the national election. The FPÖ, as it’s known, wants to "remigrate" Austrian nationals with migrant roots to create a more "homogenous" society.
The last 12 months have been a bonanza for this former fringe of the political spectrum. There have been big wins for France’s National Rally, led by Marine Le Pen, as well as for Dutch anti-Islam radical Geert Wilders and the neighboring Alternative for Germany, which is being monitored by Berlin’s own intelligence agency for suspected extremism.
"The overall trend is unmistakable: The far right is gaining ground," said Matthijs Rooduijn, a politics professor at the University of Amsterdam. European "far-right parties are here to stay," agreed Cas Mudde, a professor of international affairs at the University of Georgia and the author of 2019’s "The Far Right Today."
Some scholars trace the roots of this surge to two events: the global financial crisis of 2007-08 and the 2015 spike in migration into Europe, fueled by wars and unrest across the Middle East and North Africa. The economic crash left Europeans poorer, with crumbling public services and infrastructure. The border crisis added to that a rapid influx of people, many from Muslim-majority countries.
It's a familiar cocktail: an economically beleaguered population turning to racism as a salve. In recent decades, rises in immigration during economic downturns have pushed "voters to the most extreme version of the far right, blaming immigrants for unemployment," according to a 2018 study in the London peer-reviewed journal Electoral Studies.
Today is no different, with historic inflation rates, the erosion of social programs and Europe’s energy crisis stoking economic angst.
"Indigenous people are being ignored because of the mass immigration," Wilders, leader of the Dutch Party for Freedom, said last year. "We have to think about our own people first now. Borders closed. Zero asylum-seekers."
Wilders, who rejects the "far right" label, has previously called Islam "the ideology of a retarded culture" and once suggested an annual "head-rag tax" of 1,000 euros (about US$ 1,100) for anyone wearing Islamic clothing.
A hop over into France, Le Pen has attempted to soften her party’s image from the days when, in 2010, she likened Muslim street prayers to the Nazi occupation of France. Still, in 2017, she called France "a university for jihadists," alleging it had become an incubator for Islamist terrorism.
The Alternative for Germany party, which is polling in second place in that country, said in an email that "terms like 'right-wing extremist,' 'Islamophobic' or 'nationalist' are only intended to distract from the real problems in this country."
It said it "advocates the preservation of democracy" and claims it sees German citizens as equal "regardless of someone’s ethnic or cultural background." However, the party said it "clearly opposes an Islamist religious practice that is directed against the free democratic basic order, our laws and against the Judeo-Christian and humanistic foundations of our culture."
These parties often share Trumpian protectionist policies — from backing trade tariffs to opposing arming Ukraine — as well as economic populism, aspects of which have been more traditionally associated with the left: supporting pensions and social services, raising some taxes on the wealthy while lowering them for the working class, or price controls on rent and food during periods of high inflation.