Populist currents and fragile coalitions: Trump’s shadow over Europe

EU Confidential

POLITICO

Politics, News Commentary, News

4.4 • 175 Ratings

🗓️ 9 May 2025

⏱️ 30 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Europe’s political center is wobbling. Again. In Germany, a dramatic Bundestag vote leaves new Chancellor Friedrich Merz bruised before he’s even begun. In Romania, the first round of the presidential election wipes out the mainstream — and puts a Trump-admiring provocateur on top. EU Confidential breaks down a week of shaken coalitions, rising populists, and what they all say about the shifting balance of power in Europe.Host Sarah Wheaton is joined by Politico’s Nette Nöstlinger in Berlin, our in-house Romanian expert Carmen Paun, and Chief Political Correspondent in Europe and the U.K. Tim Ross to explore what’s driving the backlash against the mainstream — and how Trump’s influence plays out very differently across the map. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Today's episode is presented by the Roma Foundation for Europe.
0:05.1	Six million Roma live in the EU.
0:07.8	They are Europe's largest, youngest, and fastest-growing minority, and an untapped economic
0:13.5	powerhouse.
0:15.1	Investing in their skills and entrepreneurship is essential to Europe's competitiveness and
0:19.7	prosperity.
0:21.1	That is the mission of the Roma Foundation for Europe.
0:24.7	Learn more at Roma for Europe.org.
0:30.2	Europe's mainstream politicians these days are looking, well, pretty lame.
0:37.1	The political center keeps taking hits, both at the ballot box, like in Romania, and in the
0:43.9	halls of power, as just happened quite dramatically in Germany.
0:48.7	I mean, look at Friedrich Merz.
0:51.6	We, and I include the media in this, have been practically coronating
0:55.4	the guy as chancellor since SNAP elections were called in November. When it came time to rubber-stamp
1:00.8	his promotion, he actually failed to win the first round of balloting.
1:10.1	That exposed to just how fragile, and far from grand his coalition really is.
1:15.6	... to the Bundeskance of the Bundesrepublic of
1:18.6	Germany.
1:20.6	And in Romania, a Trump-loving populist named Georges Simeon surged ahead in the first round of the presidential election.
1:29.2	This is not about a person. This is about the will of the people.
1:39.5	So why are the Germans and the Romanians feeling so bitter about the political establishment?
1:45.4	Will new voices at the top of the EU power structure bring about the big changes people want?
	...

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