@nimh,
Mind you, there appears to be some evidence that Trump is having an effect on the Dutch elections...
The far-right Freedom Party of Geert Wilders, who has whole-heartedly embraced Donald Trump, has been slipping in the polls. Last December, it was
still riding high at 31-37 seats, which translates into about 20-24% of the vote. Less than a quarter of the vote, but in the fragmented Dutch electoral landscape easily enough to rank as the largest party -- and certainly more than a far-right party ever got before in a Dutch election.
But by now, Wilders' PVV
is down to 24-28 seats, or about 17% of the vote. Still enough to rank first, but only narrowly so. (Also worth pointing out that the Green Left and the Socialists together pool a larger share of the vote, at some 18%).
Again, there is a variety of contexts. Prime Minister Rutte and his conservative-liberal VVD have been surprisingly adamant that they will not work with Wilders in any coalition government after the election. That may play a role. At the same time, Rutte has coopted some of Wilders' harsh rhetoric. Wilders has also stuck to his habit of not really doing any campaigning - he's done one interview; hasn't, I think, taken part in any debate yet; and doesn't really do public events. He mainly just relies on Twitter. He got a lot of blowback the other day for tweeting a photoshopped picture, in which a liberal politician was montaged into a Muslim fundamentalist demonstration. Who knows to what extent any of this plays a role.
But Trump may also have had a deterrent effect. A poll
released last weekend found that 69% of the Dutch have a negative opinion of Trump's measures as President so far, and only 15% had a positive opinion. Surprisingly, even Freedom Party voters were somewhat ambivalent. Just 49% of them evaluated Trump's measures positively, while 25% had a negative opinion. (The voters of all the other parties, from left to right, were negative by an at least 11%/70% split.) The
Financial Daily reported that "pollsters say many Freedom Party sympathizers have been taken aback by the behavior of US President Trump, with whom Wilders empathically identifies".
Still, no reason to get too optimistic. A rogue VVD MP opined the other day that the Netherlands should impose an immigration stop on all young men from the Middle East and Africa. A whopping 52% of the Dutch agrees, the same poll from last weekend showed. That includes, of course, 96% of Freedom Party voters, but also two-thirds of the voters of 50 Plus (a party for older people), half the voters of the center-right parties VVD and CDA, and a third of Socialist Party voters. Only Labour Party and Green Left voters were overwhelmingly opposed.
