World

Friday

Gavin Mortimer Gavin Mortimer

Jewish football fans are not safe in Europe

Israeli football fans were attacked in Amsterdam on Thursday evening and three supporters are listed as missing this morning. It is reported that the assailants yelled ‘Free Palestine’ as they kicked and punched the Jewish supporters. According to the Israeli foreign ministry, a group of masked men, some of whom were draped in Palestine flags, ambushed the Israelis after their Europa League match against Ajax. A dozen supporters were injured and three are still unaccounted for on Friday morning. The fear in France is that next Thursday won’t be so passive when the Israeli team are in town The Times of Israel reports that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has despatched

Jim Lawley

Trump’s triumph has infuriated the Spanish left

‘Everybody’s lost but me,’ mutters a teenage Indiana Jones emerging from a cave in the middle of the desert to find that the boy scouts with whom he arrived have now disappeared without trace. Spain’s left-wing prime minister might be excused for thinking much the same. Relentlessly upbeat about the benefits of immigration, Pedro Sánchez now finds himself more or less alone in the European Union. And just when he was hoping that fellow progressive Kamala Harris would win the US election, he finds instead that he’s going to have to contend with Donald Trump.  ‘We will work on our strategic bilateral relations and a strong transatlantic partnership,’ Sánchez said, presumably

Philip Patrick Philip Patrick

Kamala Harris and the death of the celebrity endorsement

Poor old Bruce Springsteen. The legendary rocker bet the farm on an endorsement of Kamala Harris and may well have alienated about half his audience as a result. The ‘Boss’ who had built his career on empathising with the hard-grafting, blue-collar, Bud-swilling ‘deplorables’ with his anthems of white working-class alienation, recorded a folksy recommendation from the counter of a (real or staged – who knows?) diner. ‘Freedom, social justice, equal opportunity, the right to love who you want’ are on the ballot, pleaded Springsteen, adding that Trump’s ‘disdain for the constitution’ should disqualify him from office. Harrison Ford followed suit in two ads run just before polling day. The Star

Thursday

Lara Prendergast Lara Prendergast

Trump’s comeback, Labour’s rural divide, and World of Warcraft

37 min listen

This week: King of the Hill You can’t ignore what could be the political comeback of the century: Donald Trump’s remarkable win in this week’s US election. The magazine this week carries analysis about why Trump won, and why the Democrats lost, from Freddy Gray, Niall Ferguson and Yascha Mounk, amongst others. To make sense of how Trump became only the second President in history to win non-consecutive terms, we’re joined by the journalist Jacqueline Sweet and Cliff Young, president of polling at Ipsos (00:58). Next: is Labour blind to rural communities? The changes to inheritance tax for farmers are one of the measures from Labour’s budget that has attracted the

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

Are we about to see Trump unleashed?

32 min listen

Kamala Harris has delivered her concession speech, signalling the start of the Democrat post-mortem. Donald Trump has secured a total victory, the kind which gives him a mandate to make some pretty radical reforms. Americano guest host Kate Andrews is joined by Jacob Heilbrunn, editor of The National Interest, to discuss what a second Trump term will look like: from domestic to foreign policy. And what about the Democrats? Where do they go from here? 

Constantin Eckner

Germany’s traffic-light coalition was doomed from the start

Germany’s ruling traffic-light coalition – which has looked shaky since it was formed three years ago – has finally collapsed. Chancellor Olaf Scholz said he had no trust in his finance minister Christian Lindner, who leads the Free Democrats. Scholz’s decision to act against Lindner follows months of disagreements between Scholz’s Social Democratic Party (SPD), the Free Democrats and the Greens over budget policy and the country’s economic direction. A vote of confidence, which could pave the way for early elections, will take place early next year. As the ruling coalition has been busy tearing itself apart, Alternative for Germany (AfD) has been making headway, gaining support in several federal

Gavin Mortimer Gavin Mortimer

What Marine Le Pen can learn from Donald Trump

The reaction of Marine Le Pen and her party to the stunning triumph of Donald Trump was curiously flat. Emmanuel Macron tweeted his congratulations to the 47th President of the United States early on Wednesday morning, an hour before there was any reaction from Le Pen, the woman who had once been proud to liken herself to a Gallic Trump. When it came, Le Pen’s message was tepid. She wished him ‘every success’, and added: ‘This new political era should contribute to the strengthening of bilateral relations and the pursuit of constructive dialogue and cooperation on the international stage.’ Le Pen has distanced herself from Trump for a while now Contrast

David Christopher Kaufman

I voted for Kamala Harris – but I’m not surprised she lost

In the end, I voted for Kamala Harris, but I always knew she was destined to lose. After all, if Harris was having trouble convincing me – a mixed-race gay Northern Californian – to get behind her, her chances were worrisomely slim. And the Harris campaign – rushed and reckless, relying on the same tired playbook that failed Hillary Clinton in 2016 – appears to have lost the vast American middle in spectacular fashion. Harris had plenty more to offer – if only she hadn’t been so afraid to let it loose The biggest problem for Harris is that she wasted every opportunity to make herself seem interesting. Here is

Yascha Mounk

Reality check: why the Democrats lost

For the past decade, Donald Trump has been the most famous and influential man on the planet. But he had too many failures and electoral defeats to his name to be able to claim he dominated a whole political era. That changed on Tuesday night. Trump will be remembered as both the 45th and the 47th President of the United States. At the time of going to press, he is very likely to win full control of Congress. He is even likely to win the popular vote – making him the first Republican to do so in 20 years. All of this will allow him to impose his will on

The Spectator

What Britain can learn from Donald Trump’s victory

This has been the year of ejection elections. Across the democratic world, incumbents have been thrown out and insurgents have triumphed. And nowhere has the establishment been so humbled, the insurgency so resurgent, as in the US – still the world’s greatest democracy. For Democrats, it is mourning again in America. Just as in 2016, it is not just their candidate who has been defeated but their beliefs about their country. There are lessons for them, and for all political actors across the West, in Donald Trump’s victory. The failure of the Democrat campaign shows the folly of telling voters what they should think The Democrat campaign was premised on

Niall Ferguson

Not even close: how Trump confounded the pundits

It was supposed to be close. On the eve of election day, Donald Trump was up just 0.1 per cent in the RealClearPolitics polling average. FiveThirtyEight projected a tiny Trump advantage. PredictIt had Kamala Harris ahead. A celebrated pollster ran 80,000 simulations, and Harris won 50.015 per cent of them, versus 49.985 per cent for Trump. And it made some sense to expect a close result. With the exception of Barack Obama’s victories, every US election since 2000 has been close. In two cases, 2000 and 2016, the winner didn’t win the popular vote, which before then hadn’t happened since 1888, when Benjamin Harrison beat Grover Cleveland. What makes American

Lionel Shriver Lionel Shriver

The real test for the republic

It’s always intimidating to write for a readership more clued up than you are. I file this on the very Tuesday the international commentariat have relentlessly claimed is the most consequential election day in American history. Now, in my ignorance, I suspect this superlative reflects the blinkered vanity of the present, and I’ve braved expressing my trust on the record that the country will ultimately survive either dismaying outcome. Yet only you know if an anti-climactic calm still prevails down thousands of American Main Streets; if, rather, the cities are aflame, armed militias reign, supermarket shelves are bare, and the US army is trying to decide which side to back;

Freddy Gray Freddy Gray

American titan: inside Donald Trump’s remarkable political comeback

Palm Beach, Florida Donald Trump’s bid to take back the White House has been triumphant. It is a decisive victory and even Trump’s bitterest enemies should recognise him for what he is: an American titan, the most extraordinary politician of our time. He has just pulled off arguably the biggest comeback in US history – a feat greater even than Richard Nixon’s Lazarus-like return in 1968. To understand the scale of his victory, recall how weakly he began. On 15 November 2022, when Trump launched his now-triumphant bid to regain the presidency, he did not seem himself. His formal campaign announcement, delivered in the ballroom of his club in Mar-a-Lago,

Wednesday

Matt McDonald

Kamala Harris finally concedes defeat

US Vice President Kamala Harris finally took the stage at her alma mater, Washington, DC’s Howard University – a day later than anticipated, to deliver a 12-minute concession speech. She walked out at 4:24 p.m. ET Wednesday, somewhat ironically, to the chorus of Beyoncé’s ‘Freedom’: Freedom, freedom, I can’t loseFreedom I can’t lose ‘The outcome of this election is not what we wanted, not what we fought for, not what we voted for – but hear me when I say that the light of America’s promise will always burn bright as long as we never give up and as long as we keep fighting’, Harris said. She added: ‘I am

Lisa Haseldine Lisa Haseldine

Olaf Scholz calls time on Germany’s traffic-light coalition

Just as Germany, along with the rest of Europe, begins to process what Donald Trump’s return to the White House will mean, more instability is heading its way – this time domestic. This evening, German chancellor Olaf Scholz fired the finance minister and FDP leader Christian Lindner, kicking the FDP party out of government and bringing Berlin’s traffic-light coalition crashing down. The result: Germany is probably off to the polls. Speaking at a hastily called press conference in the Bundestag following Lindner’s dismissal, Scholz announced that that he would be holding a vote of confidence in himself on 15 January. If that goes badly, the federal election – originally planned

Kate Andrews Kate Andrews

Lionel Shriver on the election that smashed identity politics

29 min listen

News that Kamala Harris has called Donald Trump to concede defeat means that the US election is all but over. Of the seven crucial swing states, Trump has so far won North Carolina, Georgia, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Michigan. Republicans have taken the Senate back from the Democrats. How did things go so badly for Kamala Harris? Is this the end of identity politics? Lionel Shriver, author and columnist, joins The Spectator’s economics editor Kate Andrews to reflect on what happened, and how she’s feeling now considering she disliked both Kamala Harris and Donald Trump as candidates.

Lisa Haseldine Lisa Haseldine

Why is Putin not congratulating Donald Trump?

It’s long been assumed that Donald Trump is Russian president Vladimir Putin’s preferred opposite number in Washington. So it might come as a surprise to learn that the discussion in the Kremlin this morning has been whether or not Putin should congratulate the new president-elect on his victory at all. Putin’s press secretary Dmitry Peskov told reporters he had no idea whether the president planned to send his regards to Trump. Whether or not he did, Peskov said, would have little difference: ‘It is practically impossible to make things worse; relations are historically at their lowest point.’ America, he reminded the press pack, was still an ‘unfriendly country that is

John O’Neill and Michael Simmons

How Donald did it: the road to the White House in charts and graphs

Donald Trump has become the first president since Grover Cleveland to be elected to non-consecutive terms in the White House. But how did he do it? Pollsters and pundits had predicted a close-run thing with Harris ahead in key states but in the end, the betting markets were right: Donald Trump swept to victory. When Big Ben bongs at 10 p.m. on election night in the UK we’re told straight away who the next prime minister will be. American exit polls don’t quite work like that. Instead, AP and Fox News’s exit poll showed us that the economy and immigration were the top issues for voters. But another poll for

Owen Matthews

Donald Trump’s win marks the beginning of the end of the Ukraine war

Donald Trump’s election victory heralds the beginning of the end of the Ukraine war – and is likely to leave Vladimir Putin in control of most, if not all, of the territory he has seized in nearly three years of bloody conflict. To many Ukrainians, such an outcome will be a betrayal of their struggle, a stab in the back by the West that will sow decades of anger and resentment. To others, though, a swift end to the conflict before more land is lost and tens of thousands more young Ukrainians die represents the best hope of actually salvaging a decent future for their country before their infrastructure, economy,

Eliot Wilson

Nato should be worried about Donald Trump

When it comes to Donald Trump’s relationship with Nato, there are two principal schools of thought. The first, articulated by Trump’s own former national security advisor, John Bolton, is that the president-elect is hostile to the alliance at an elemental and instinctive level. The second, proposed by those who are favourable to him, argues that Trump’s inflammatory language about Nato’s failures is a performance, which in the past goaded fellow member states into increasing their defence spending. Look not, they say, at what he says, but at the results. It is indisputable that the financial commitments of member states to Nato now are much higher than when Trump first assumed