A new trend in global elections – the anti-Trump bump

TORONTO – The Trump factor is shaping global politics, one election at a time – just not necessarily to the President’s taste.

In major votes in Canada and Australia over the past two weeks, centrists saw their fortunes revived, while parties that had borrowed from the Maga (Make America Great Again) playbook lost out.

US President Donald Trump has been back in power for only three months, but already, his policies, including imposing tariffs and upending alliances, have rippled into domestic political battles around the world.

Although it is too soon to say that anti-Trump forces are on the rise globally, it is clear that voters have Mr Trump somewhere on their mind as they make decisions.

Political cousins

Canada and Australia share a lot in common: a political system, a major mining industry, a sovereign in King Charles. Now, they also share a remarkable political story.

In both countries, before Mr Trump was inaugurated, the centre-left ruling parties had been in poor shape and appeared poised to lose power. The front runners in polls were the conservative parties, whose leaders flirted with Trumpian politics in style and substance.

Within weeks after Mr Trump’s return to power, the Canadian and Australian political scenarios flipped in the same way: The centre-left incumbents surged ahead of the conservative oppositions, and went on to win.

Both countries’ conservative leaders lost not just the elections – they even lost their own seats in Parliament.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney campaigned on an explicitly anti-Trump message, putting the US President’s threats to Canada at the heart of his campaign. Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese did not.

But both men got an anti-Trump bump.

Conservative leaders faced a scathing rejection at the ballot box. Mr Pierre Poilievre, head of the Canadian conservatives, and Mr Peter Dutton, the leader of those in Australia, struggled to shake off a damaging association with Mr Trump.

Mr Dutton had walked back or moderated some Trumpian policy proposals when they proved to be unpopular, including radically slashing the public-sector workforce. Mr Poilievre never really pivoted away from the Trump approach, even after the US President threatened Canada’s sovereignty.

Dr Charles Edel, Australia chair at the Centre for Strategic and International Studies think-tank, called

the election in Australia

a “blowout”. He suggested that it had resulted, at least in part, because of Mr Trump’s implicit intrusion into the election, even if it had been mostly focused on domestic issues.

“There were enough similarities to the Canadian election to suggest that the conservatives’ fortunes fell as Trump’s tariffs and attacks on America’s allies ramped up,” he wrote in an e-mail.

In Canada, some saw the Australian election result as a sign of solidarity from their cousins to the far south. “Albo Up!” an online meme said, swopping Mr Albanese’s nickname into Mr Carney’s hockey-inspired anti-Trump slogan: “Elbows Up!”

Flight to safety

Mr Carney benefited from a perception among voters that he would be a stable hand to manage Mr Trump and his unpredictable impact on Canada’s economy, which is deeply integrated with the US’ and already hurting because of tariffs and uncertainty. His background as an economic policymaker also worked in his favour.

Across the world, in Singapore, the argument for stability in times of turmoil also appeared to help the incumbent People’s Action Party.

In April, Prime Minister Lawrence Wong said in Parliament that Singapore would sustain a bigger hit from the new US tariffs because of its reliance on global trade. He called on Singaporeans to brace themselves for more shocks, and predicted slower growth.

Much like Mr Carney, who declared the old relationship between Canada and the US “over”, PM Wong issued a gloomy warning ahead of the election. “The global conditions that enabled Singapore’s success over the past decades may no longer hold,” he said.

On May 3,

voters returned his party to power

, an outcome that was never in doubt but was still seen as bolstered by the “flight to safety” strategy that the PAP deployed.

Dr Cherian George, who has written books about Singaporean politics, said: “This is another case of the Trump effect. The sense of deep concern about Trump’s trade wars is driving a decisive number of voters to show strong support for the incumbent.”

Mixed impact

In Germany, an important Western ally that was the first to hold a national election after Mr Trump’s inauguration, the effect of the Trump factor has been less direct, but it has still been felt.

Mr Friedrich Merz, who will be sworn in as Germany’s new chancellor on May 6, did not profit politically from Mr Trump’s election the way that leaders in Canada or Australia did in the more recent votes.

But if Mr Trump’s confrontation with the US’ European allies on defence and trade did not help Mr Merz before the vote, it has helped him since.

Mr Merz was able to push through a suspension of spending limits in fiscally austere Germany, which will make his job as chancellor easier. He did so by arguing that the old certainties about US commitment to mutual defence were gone.

“Do you seriously believe that an American government will agree to continue Nato as before?” he asked lawmakers in March.

The Maga-sphere’s embrace of a far-right German party known as the AfD did not help it, according to polls, even though Mr Elon Musk had gone as far as to endorse the party and to appear at one of its events by video stream. NYTIMES