Brussels (Brussels Morning) – JD Vance has shocked analysts with his speech Friday by focusing it on issues surrounding European democracies and freedom of expression rather than external threats like the war in Ukraine or the rising tensions with China.
If you are running in fear of your own voters, there is nothing America can do for you
Friday at the 2025 Munich Security Conference, the American Vice-President JD Vance delivered a characteristically surprising speech concerning his administration’s analysis of the problems Europe is facing.
What I worry the most about, vis-à-vis Europe, is not Russia […] it is the threat from within. The retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values
he said to preface his speech.
A risky statement as there has been war in Europe for the past 3 years – he went on to directly call out recent developments across the continent, condemning Romania’s annulment of the national elections won by the far-right independent candidate Călin Georgescu, while also slamming Brussels for its willingness to block social media platforms during protests under the pretext of regulating “hateful content”.
He continued his list of criticism by taking aim at different European countries, the UK’s controversial criminalization of silent prayer near abortion clinics being another example he deemed as a dangerous precedent in suppressing free expression under the guise of social order.
“In Washington there is a new sheriff in town”
The Trump administration has lived up, for the better or for the worse, to the expectations built up during the American election campaign. With a stronger more nationalist approach to foreign policy, the image of the sheriff used in the Vice-President’s speech shouldn’t be overlooked – a sheriff is a strong masculine image associated with American ideal of their Manifest Destiny and strength. Europeans be warned; we will not be able to say we were not aware of it.
In a further show of dissidence from the status quo in Munich, Vance referenced Brexit as an example of the people’s will being expressed and seems to be using internal conflicts within the EU as political leverage – a realist stance which seems aligned with Trump’s recent aggressive tariff implementations, mostly used as leverage for international political agreements.
Moreover, the American Vice-President has also put mass migration and illegal immigration as a main focus of his appearance in Germany, a way to further solidify the external impact of Trump’s administration on the European political market of ideas – in other words, the United States Government is now prepared to strengthen European discussion around cultural identity and immigration while weakening concerns over climate change and globalism. This political attitude is exemplified through special government employee Elon Musk’s support of the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party for instance.
It is important to note that while Vance’s address resonated with certain factions, it was met with silence and discomfort from many European officials present at the conference.
Europe, and specifically the EU, has met American political interferences with a lot of skepticism as expressed by the French politician Thierry Breton when he was still the Internal Market Commissioner of the EU.
The issue is, however, that in quite a symbolic way Breton has since resigned from his position – it is not clear if this EU resistance to the American cultural shift will be able to survive the upcoming German elections and the 2027 French national elections.
