As the 2024 US presidential election approaches, Europe faces renewed uncertainty about its relationship with the US. Donald Trump’s potential return to the White House triggers concerns about transatlantic ties and multilateralism. His “America First” policy and the termination of support for numerous international agreements and organisations is generally regarded as exceptional, erratic, and apocalyptical for the international order. By contrast, Kamala Harris is associated with hopes for normality in the transatlantic partnership and a commitment to a rules-based international order.

At first glance, the two candidates could not be more different. However, treating Trump as an anomaly risks missing deeper, longer-term trends in US foreign policy – trends that Europeans must now prepare for, regardless of the election outcome. To safeguard the rules-based international order that has immensely benefited them, Europeans must draw the right lessons from the past and stop considering Trump’s policies a mere aberration. This blog post draws on six years of research into the ambivalent relationship between the US and multilateralism – under Trump and beyond – to argue that the withdrawal of US support from multilateral institutions is not a novel but a more general phenomenon. Rather than being irrational and erratic, the US withdrawal of support tends to follow strategic calculations. Importantly, multilateral institutions abandoned by the US are not doomed to fail but often remarkably resilient.