Jamie Dettmer is an associate editor and a foreign affairs columnist at POLITICO.
If Democrats do as well as expected in today’s U.S. midterm elections, champagne corks will pop across Europe. But those raising a glass may want to think about the morning after.
A Democratic takeover of Congress is unlikely to offer Europe immediate relief. Constrained at home, Trump would still be free to focus on foreign policy and trade, where the U.S. executive branch faces relatively few congressional checks — increasing the risk of fresh disputes and tougher demands on Europe.
“It would be a mistake for Europeans to assume there will be warmer transatlantic relations,” said Wolfgang Ischinger, the veteran German diplomat and former chair of the Munich Security Conference. “My assumption is the exact opposite will happen.”
A recent EU-wide survey found 58 percent of respondents rooting for the Democrats, compared with just 18 percent for Donald Trump’s Republicans. But while opinion polls suggest the U.S. president’s European critics will get their wish, they’d better avoid any triumphalism or crowing, counsels Ischinger.
“There will be voices here in Europe, some important ones, who’ll want to celebrate and congratulate the Democrats, but I think that would be poisonous,” he told POLITICO.
“I’d advise my European friends to be restrained and avoid creating any pretext for the White House to be mad at Europe — that is any more than it already is,” he added with a chuckle.
Others are skeptical that reticence will make any difference. They include Nathalie Tocci, a former adviser to two EU foreign policy chiefs.
“To be honest, I don’t think Trump really needs any reasons or excuses to lash out at Europe,” she said. And it will be hard not to celebrate, she argued, if you “care about democracy,” given the ties between Trump’s MAGA movement and populist, far-right politicians in Europe.
A setback for Trump could lift the spirits of Europe’s liberals and centrists, who have seized on electoral rebuffs for Hungary’s Viktor Orbán and Serbia’s Aleksandar Vučić as evidence that populism has peaked — or at least plateaued.
That conclusion may be premature. The polling strength of France’s Marine Le Pen and recent gains by Germany’s Alternative for Germany suggest populist politics remain potent. Still, a rebuff for MAGA would give liberals and centrists a morale boost, Tocci said.
But would a Democratic victory benefit the EU in the near term? “Not much,” Ischinger said. A Democratic takeover of Congress would have little practical impact on Europe and could even make matters worse.
A voter fills out their ballot at a polling station in Minneapolis, Minnesota on Oct. 28, 2026. | Stephen Maturen/Getty Images“If Donald Trump finds himself ensnared in congressional investigations, impeachment procedures and is constrained on the domestic front by a hostile Congress, he’s bound to gravitate to where Congress is weak — on foreign and trade policies,” he added. “We need to brace ourselves for not more harmonious transatlantic relations but more acrimony and even more Trump demands on Europe.”
Kurt Volker, who served as George W. Bush’s last U.S. ambassador to NATO, is of the same mind.
“Don’t expect much change from the Trump administration,” he cautioned. “Congress will investigate everything. They will investigate Trump, his family, Trump family businesses, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, Elon Musk, Pete Hegseth and Kash Patel at the FBI. Trump will fight this all the way, and it’ll be a big circus.”
“Okay, the Democrats will be much more supportive of Ukraine and NATO, but they can’t direct Trump to do things,” he added. “They can approve money, but Trump just turns around and says, ‘Well, I don’t have to spend it.’”
Volker predicts Trump will step up his use of pocket rescission, a contested legal theory for clawing back congressionally appropriated funds. “That has been the pattern on so many things, tariffs most notably,” said Volker. “But on lots of things, he’d prefer to run out the clock and fight in the courts.”
The former ambassador said he’s unsure which way Trump will go when it comes to Iran — relaunch military operations or leave the crisis for Europe and Asia to solve. On NATO and reducing U.S. deployments in Europe, Volker suspects Trump will be careful out of fear of domestic backlash.
Then again, Trump is “extraordinarily hard to predict,” said Bronwen Maddox, director and CEO of Britain’s Chatham House think tank. “Maybe he’ll retreat after a bit of initial lashing out at the election result and focus on his planned monuments, including the White House ballroom,” she speculated hopefully but without too much conviction.
Maddox sees no cause for celebration, whatever the election result or Trump’s response. European leaders should instead reflect on how much the U.S. has changed. “American voters elected Trump twice, and even if they now turn on him, those elections show their focus is now inward,” she said.
Europeans were slow to grasp the significance of MAGA and how long the movement might endure, Maddox said. She believes too little recognition remains of how much the American political landscape has changed — including the Democratic Party.
“I don’t think America sees itself in Europe in the way it used to,” she said. “For me, that message has been clear for some time.”