4 in 10 Europeans also say the US president “acts like a dictator.”
More than half of Europeans consider U.S. President Donald Trump an “enemy of Europe,” according to a survey conducted in the EU’s eight largest countries and Denmark.
In the poll, aimed at taking the temperature of European citizens on transatlantic relations and security issues ahead of the ongoing European Council summit, 51 percent say Trump — a longtime massive EU skeptic — is an enemy of the continental alliance.
According to the survey, commissioned by Le Grand Continent and Cluster 17 and conducted among more than 10,000 people between March 11 and 14, even more people — 63 percent — say that Trump’s election makes the world less safe.
Only 13 percent believe Trump “respects democratic principles,” while 43 percent say the U.S. president “has authoritarian tendencies” and 39 percent even think Trump “acts like a dictator.”
It’s not just Trump who is viewed negatively: In the countries surveyed, almost 8 out of 10 citizens believe that billionaire presidential adviser Elon Musk cannot be trusted, and almost half of respondents in Belgium, Denmark and France say that Europeans should boycott Tesla’s electric cars.
Fifty-five percent of respondents say there is a high risk of armed conflict on EU territory in the coming years, with the eastern countries of Romania and Poland the most worried (74 percent and 71 percent, respectively) — though they also generally have a higher level of trust in Trump than Western Europeans.
Only a tenth of respondents say the EU can rely on Trump’s America to ensure its security and defense, while 70 percent say the bloc must rely solely on its own forces to ensure its protection.
Opinion is more divided on whether that should be via national armies or a common European force, but a majority in most countries would support a common EU military.
