Why a Democratic Win in US Midterms Could Carry Risks for Europe

The US midterm elections appear to favor the Democrats, with polls suggesting they hold an average eight-point lead in both the House of Representatives and the Senate. That raises a question for Europe: could a Democratic victory in one or both chambers influence upcoming elections across the continent?

Analysts and observers told Al Jazeera the answer is not fundamentally. Beyond a welcome improvement in transatlantic relations, they identified two possible downsides. One is complacency among Europeans about their own far-right movements. The other is a push by President Donald Trump to pressure Ukraine into a deal with Russia that Kyiv does not want.

Catherine Fieschi, a nonresident scholar at Carnegie Europe who specializes in European far-right politics, said a Democratic House win, let alone control of both chambers, would be read as proof that "democracies bounce back". It would feed the idea, she said, that such developments do not mean "the advent of a fascist regime". Speaking from Paris, she imagined a debate over whether a Marine Le Pen victory should be feared as much as some claim, or whether it is simply "swings and roundabouts" with voters able to correct course later.

Le Pen currently leads polling for the French presidential election scheduled for April 18, with surveys showing her at about 34 percent of the vote. There is precedent for the kind of complacency Fieschi described. A June 2025 poll by the European Council on Foreign Relations, taken after Trump's first six months back in office, found clear majorities in Western Europe saying the US political system was broken. Majorities in Eastern Europe said it worked well, though that sample leaned toward right-wing voters.

Greek Migration Minister Thanos Plevris cautioned against overstating American influence on European views. He said European opinion on asylum and economic migration hardened on its own, pointing to Germany's move from a welcoming stance to a more controlled policy. But he said the US changed the tone, shifting toward deterrence, border protection and increased returns, and he believes that pivot played a role in Europe.

Ukraine is the other concern. Fieschi said a Le Pen presidency would bring three controversial proposals: cutting French contributions to the EU budget to fund earlier retirement, reducing military aid to Ukraine, and possibly leaving the euro for a devalued franc. A cut in French aid would remove 3.5 percent of Ukraine's foreign military aid, according to the Kiel Institute's Ukraine Support Tracker, a gap other allies would have to fill.

Fieschi also warned that a weakened White House might see Trump "clinching deals with Putin as fast as he can". That refers to a US-Russian effort to push Ukraine into a peace agreement that surrenders the eastern Donbas region. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has said this would be a strategic error leading to renewed war, and most Ukrainians oppose it. Trump has already used US early warning on incoming ballistic missiles and Starlink satellite navigation as leverage against Ukraine, and has twice echoed Russian calls to replace Zelenskyy.

Victoria Vdovychenko, a Ukraine expert at Cambridge University's Centre for Geopolitics, said Russia could also intensify its "all-domain war" against Europe. "Cognitive warfare never stopped on the European continent, and Russians are already using existing vulnerabilities to the utmost," she said.

Observers say European opinion has already shifted sharply. A Bertelsmann Stiftung poll found only 31 percent of Europeans see the US as Europe's "most trustworthy ally", down from 51 percent in 2024. Some 73 percent say Europe should "go its own way", up from 63 percent. A June Pew Research Center poll across 36 countries found 76 percent expressing no confidence in Trump. Such views, formed over two Trump terms, would be hard to reverse in a single congressional election, especially with a Russian war ongoing in Europe.