Recent reporting by the Financial Times that the United States Department of State is seeking to fund MAGA-aligned think tanks and charities across Europe — ostensibly to fend off “threats to free speech” — once more underscores the ideological battle Europe faces during the second Trump administration.

The strategy broadly aligns with the current US administration’s ideology and its views on alleged restrictions on free speech in Europe, particularly the bloc’s efforts to regulate social media. In early February, the US Republican House Committee on the Judiciary published an investigation into “European censorship laws”, claiming the European Union systematically undermines American free speech online. It further alleged that the European Commission pressured platforms to censor political speech ahead of elections, thereby linking the matter to supposed election interference.

The allegations were swiftly adopted by far-right actors and politicians online, further sowing anti-EU sentiment and fuelling distrust in democratic processes. Balázs Orbán, political director of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán (no relation), who faces the possibility of losing the April 2026 elections after 16 years in power, claimed online that similar measures were planned for the Hungarian election, alleging that the EU seeks regime change.

Such claims, spread by a hegemonic actor like the US, automatically lend them an air of legitimacy. They can seriously undermine trust in elections while bolstering far-right talking points that question the democratic legitimacy of European leaders, thereby contributing to rising political resentment.

Beyond its confrontational stance toward the European Union and the transatlantic alliance, and its open expression of anti-democratic, extreme-right views, the Trump administration’s planned financial backing of ideologically aligned think tanks poses an additional challenge to European democracies. The timing of such US-funded intellectual and ideological interference is ripe: right-wing think tanks and government-organised non-governmental organisations (GONGOs) are proliferating across Europe, aiming to bolster the agenda of far-right political parties and laying the groundwork for a new political hegemony characterised by nativism and authoritarianism.

Most recently, right-wing extremist activist Martin Sellner, who is associated with the far-right Austrian Identitarian Movement and (re-)popularised the term “remigration” — which the Trump White House rigorously adopted — announced plans to launch an “Institute for Remigration” in 2026. Notably, having floated the idea first late last year on one of his channels, his official announcement on X, highlighting his need for funding, came only days after the Financial Times reported on the Trump administration’s plans to fund MAGA-aligned think tanks, a description that Sellner’s envisaged organisation would certainly fit.

The Hungarian Orbán-aligned Mathias Corvinus Collegium (MCC) is already expanding its reach across Europe, having acquired a 90 per cent stake in an Austrian private university and opened an office in Brussels to influence politics at the heart of the European Union. In Poland, Ordo Iuris, aligned with the far-right Law and Justice (PiS) party, seeks to reinforce anti-abortion and anti-LGBTQIA+ positions. The groundwork of nativist, authoritarian, and anti-gender mobilisation in Europe has clearly been laid. US funding to these institutions could amplify their influence, helping them undermine European democracies from within.

Meanwhile, those formerly considered part of the political mainstream are further aiding this process. Just recently, former Austrian chancellor Sebastian Kurz, of the right-wing People’s Party, announced the founding of his new political think tank, the “Global Shift Institute”. Given Kurz’s efforts to steer his centre-right party further to the right and to mainstream far-right politics during his leadership, the ideological orientation of this new think tank appears rather obvious. Furthermore, considering his connections to authoritarian tech oligarchs — forged through his past role as an employee of Peter Thiel — the new think tank will certainly aim to further influence, or “shift”, as the name itself suggests, the political landscape, helping normalise far-right politics and ideology.

Overall, these right-wing to far-right think tanks appear already to be preparing the ground for a new political hegemony. Financial support from the Trump administration would not only facilitate their operations but also normalise and legitimise their claims.

A transatlantic cultural revolution demands a European counter-offensive

The US-sponsored ideological turn, pursued in line with the MAGA vision of a new global order through the funding of European think tanks, is in keeping with what Armida van Rij aptly called the “transatlantic cultural revolution”. On a broader scale, these efforts to bring Europe into line with the MAGA worldview once more underscore that the United States is no longer the leader of a global order associated with human rights and liberal democracy. Instead, it has become a threat to European democracies and unity.

The battle Europe faces is therefore clear. The US aim of bankrolling organisations diametrically opposed to EU institutions and democratic values plays directly into the hands of the European far right, which has been on the rise for years and has become increasingly normalised and mainstreamed — by the media and by “mainstream” political actors seeking to copy it.

In this environment, Europe’s response cannot be to once again cower and wait for the storm to pass, as it mostly did in 2016. Nor is it to adapt to this new order by accommodating its views under the false pretence that they are hegemonic — they are not.

Instead, democratic mainstream parties and progressive think tanks need a clear response strategy to counter the disinformation and illiberalism that such projects, seeking to erode liberal democracy, will bring to the continent and their countries. They need to reinforce a sense of shared European values grounded in democracy, equality, and human rights, while setting clear boundaries with the US and its apparent goals of authoritarian contagion. To this end, Europe must invest more in research institutes focused on defending democracy and countering hate speech, enabling them to craft the counterhegemonic response the moment demands. It must likewise invest in explaining why tech regulation — attacked by the right as “restricting free speech” — is vital to safeguarding, not restricting, democracy.

The US under Trump only understands and respects the language of force and determination, not previously shared “ideals”. Europe has recently demonstrated that a fairly united stance against US policy objectives can succeed, as the bloc confronted threats to Greenland. The same resolve is now needed to confront the Trump administration’s ideological offensive, in order to uphold and reinforce the shared democratic values on which the European project depends.

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