The Trump administration’s opinion of Europe isn’t a secret. In December 2025, Donald Trump described European leaders as “weak”, said their countries were “decaying” and in 2026 said the European Union was “formed in order to screw the United States“.
Senior Trump admin figures have broadly echoed this sentiment.
In Feb. 2025, JD Vance said: “What I worry about is the threat from within, the retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values”.
In Mar, 2025, Pete Hegseth is reported to have said, “I fully share your loathing of European free-loading. It’s PATHETIC” and in May 2025, Marco Rubio said: “For far too long, ideologues in Europe have led organized efforts to coerce American platforms to punish American viewpoints they oppose.”
All of which means a new survey from the European Council on Foreign Relations that indicates an overwhelming majority of Europeans no longer consider the United States an ally shouldn’t come as much of a surprise.
“A rival or an adversary”
The report confirms a “collapse” in European faith in the United States, saying that “Only 11% of respondents now consider it an ally”. It gets worse for US-Euro relations as “fully 25% see it as either a rival or an adversary”.
It names contributing factors as Trump’s threats to annex Greenland, his demands that Europeans join the war in Iran, his stance on Ukraine, his repeated negative comments about NATO, and the mass withdrawals of US troops from European bases.
If Europe were under active threat, the survey shows few Europeans think Trump would bother to help: “majorities in every European country polled think that the US would not support them if they came under attack”. The survey also indicates that Europeans are now more likely to rely on their neighbors for military support, there’s a growing consensus that defense spending must increase, and “new openness to a European nuclear deterrent”.
The report’s co-author, Jana Kobzová, said:
“Across the continent, there’s clear support for reducing dependence on Washington. Europeans are increasingly open to higher defence spending and, crucially, show a striking degree of confidence that neighbouring countries would come to their aid in a crisis.”
But for Europeans, it appears there is some light on the horizon. A majority believe that US-Euro relations will improve once Trump leaves office, saying that things will “probably get better” after his presidency.
Only time will tell whether this is overly optimistic, though, judging by the senior Trump admin comments quoted above, if one of them replaces Trump in 2028, it could be a long road to rebuilding those transatlantic bridges.
