National populists surge around the world — spelling doom for the global elite

Democrats are flummoxed that President Donald Trump can keep winning when they find his views so despicable.

Recent elections from around the world, though, provide the answer: People want conservative populism.

Argentine President Javier Milei’s recent unexpected win in his country’s congressional midterms is just one example.

His Liberty Advances alliance swept to victory in most of Argentina’s 26 states, crushing the Peronist opposition by 9 percentage points.

Milei’s allies did this the Trumpian way, by winning the blue-collar former Peronist strongholds around Buenos Aires and in rural “flyover country”.

And they did it despite relatively poor economic news: While Milei’s radical reforms did bring inflation down dramatically and usher in an economic recovery, progress had stalled.

The Argentine peso has been in freefall, prompting a $40 billion bailout from Trump shortly before the vote.

Most experts thought voters would signal their impatience with Milei’s reforms by giving the Peronists a win. Instead, they rewarded his boldness.

In recent months conservative populists have won elections in Poland and Czechia, too.

Poland’s June presidential contest was instructive: Historian and political neophyte Karol Nawrocki started the campaign in a poor position, but he won against the odds by unfailingly striking Trumpian themes on nationalism and culture.

In Czechia, October’s parliamentary elections shifted national policy rightward, with a new alliance of conservative populist parties taking the majority in the Chamber of Deputies.

Britain’s Nigel Farage and his Reform Party now leads all national polls, having swept May’s local elections, with the once-dominant Tories languishing at 20% approval.

Even apparent conservative defeats hold good news for populists.

Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party — the main conservative force despite its name — lost its majority in the House of Councillors election this summer, mainly because some of its backers turned instead to two openly populist parties that promised to “Make Japan Great Again”.

In response, the LDP dumped its colorless prime minister and replaced him with Sanae Takaichi, the nation’s first female leader, a noted hawk and nationalist who strikes similar themes to the populist Sanseito and Conservative parties.

And while PVV, The Netherlands’ premier populist party led by Geert Wilders, lost ground in last week’s elections, most of its losses went to other nationalist parties.

It’s not hard to see why conservative populists are winning worldwide.

The globalist elite has failed to bring the peace, prosperity and cultural harmony it promised, and voters are increasingly turning to parties and leaders who can deliver the goods.

Outsiders and upstart movements, like Trump and MAGA here in the United States, are untainted by complicity in the cross-partisan consensus that has governed for decades. 

This infuriates leftists around the globe — because they want more of the policies that have failed.

Like ideologues everywhere, they explain away their lack of success by saying their ideas haven’t been fully implemented or properly managed.

More migration must make up for falling birth rates.

Ever-increasing globalization will bring prosperity.

The Green New Deal’s sustainable growth will more than make up for lost jobs outsourced to the underdeveloped world.

Social progressivism hasn’t been pushed enough, in their view — and redoubts of conservative values, not offensive wokeness or trans-ideology, are why social cohesion has slipped.

Such sentiments are gaining strength on the left in response to the right’s populist surge.

Britain’s Green Party has pulled even with the ruling center-left Labour Party in recent polls, and in Germany and Norway extreme leftist forces are also on the rise.

Zohran Mamdani’s likely victory in New York City’s mayoral race is simply the American reflection of these global trends.

The younger, socially progressive voters who form Mamdani’s base blame billionaires rather than untrammeled immigration, and conservative Christians rather than woke ideologues, for the nation’s ills.

But they are every bit as angry, and every bit as opposed to their party’s old guard, as are MAGA Republicans — and their energy is driving the Democrats.

The confluence of these trends will likely play out well for Team Trump.

Americans in the middle may prefer neither side, but on a host of matters they are closer to the conservative populists than to progressive ones.

In the mayoral election, they can cast a vote for Andrew Cuomo — but in a presidential election, they probably won’t have a middle-ground option.

Forced to choose, they would likely prefer Vice President JD Vance to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in a 2028 battle of populist titans.

Old elites and ultra-progressives may not like it, but the trend is clear: Conservative populism is growing in strength, not shrinking, around the world.

Henry Olsen, a political analyst and commentator, is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.