When Marco Rubio got off the stage at the Munich security conference after declaring “that the fate of Europe will never be irrelevant to our own”, there was relief among Europeans, with many standing to show their respect.
It was a far cry from a year earlier when his colleague JD Vance shocked and rattled those present with a speech that warned that their biggest security threat came not from China or Russia but “the enemy within”. He lambasted European allies for destroying themselves with mass immigration and censorship.
It set the tone for a recalibration of the transatlantic relationship after President Trump’s return to the White House resulted in a national security strategy warning of “civilisational erasure”, tariff wars and unresolved threats to take over Greenland. European politicians have complained that they now live in a world where allies and enemies were treated equally, countries to squeeze in the name of American interest.
Rubio, 54, at least offered a positive spin on this. The Republican, who is seen in the administration as the “Europe whisperer”, tried to take the crowd with him. “It was very much ‘come on, you can do this’ not ‘you are a disgrace’ as per Vance,” said one person in the room.
Rubio’s speech had been tightly guarded before the event
ALEX BRANDON/AFP
The secretary of state still warned about immigration policies, stating that “mass migration is not some fringe concern of little consequence”, but he did it with more carrot than stick as he told his audience that “for the United States and Europe we belong together”. He said “our destiny is and always will be intertwined with yours”, a line that led to applause.
The speech showed why many Europeans prefer dealing with Rubio to Vance — the vice-president being seen as tougher to win around. In a leaked Signal chat last year, Vance said in a discussion on a strike on the Houthis: “I just hate bailing out Europe again.”
Favourites for the 2028 Republican nomination, the pair’s contrasting styles will come to the fore later this year when Karoline Leavitt, the press secretary, takes maternity leave and cabinet members step in to do the press briefings in her place.
• Starmer deploys warships to Arctic and tells EU ‘be ready to fight’
Style aside, it’s not clear much has changed when it comes to the US approach to Europe. Jeffrey Rathke, president of the American-German Institute in Washington, said: “The secretary of state has a different rhetorical approach. People expect more substantive and traditional content from him but whether they will take that as being the last word is a different thing.”
Instead, Rubio’s own journey, whether sincere as his supporters argue or careerist as his critics say, reflects the changing view of the Republican Party.
Once seen as a hawk, he attended the conference with a rather different message in 2017 — as a senator as part of a US congressional delegation led by John McCain who delivered a staunch defence of the liberal international order interpreted as a seeming alternative to Trump’s America First message.
On Saturday Rubio said that the idea that “every nation would now be a liberal democracy” and that “the rules-based global order, an overused term, would now replace the national interest” was “a foolish idea that ignored both human nature and it ignored the lessons of over 5,000 years of recorded human history. And it has cost us dearly.” His speech was tightly guarded before the event, written by his inner circle with Rubio adding large chunks himself.
What’s more, most of Rubio’s colleagues take an even harsher stance. Pete Hegseth, the war secretary, gave the whole event, seen as the annual temperature check on transatlantic relations, a miss. Rubio himself drew heat for skipping a meeting with European allies on the war in Ukraine, fuelling concerns in European capitals that the White House increasingly sees the Europeans as unhelpful in Ukraine-Russia talks.
Pete Hegseth, the US secretary of war
CHIP SOMODEVILLA/GETTY
There is further concern that the next stop on Rubio’s trip is a meeting with Viktor Orban in Hungary. While Hungary’s reliance on Russian energy will be raised, a state department official has said the visit was aimed at further “strengthening” ties with a European country that shared the Trump administration’s vision for peace in Ukraine.
Hungary, too, is in the White House’s good books for joining the president’s Board of Peace, unlike most European countries. Senior figures in the White House speak of his Board of Peace (which will meet in DC this week) as not only a flagship part of his second term foreign policy but a way Trump could continue to shape the world for years to come.
Even the immediate years are a worry to the Europeans. Diplomats are increasingly concerned that talks on a solution to give the US greater control in Greenland are not yet solved, and there could be more sabre-rattling to come.
Jeremy Shapiro, research director of the European Council on Foreign Relations, said: “I would describe US-EU relations now like the state of the Titanic right after it was hit by the iceberg, but before it sank. It’s a total disaster, but it does seem a little bit like people are sort of aware of that, but a little bit walking around hoping that the boat won’t actually sink, despite the fact that they can see water rushing into it.”
European countries are looking to reduce their dependence on America. As Mark Carney, prime minister of Canada, put it in his speech at Davos: “Middle powers must act together, because if we’re not at the table, we’re on the menu.”
One of the arguments for this is the idea that the US is effectively abandoning Europe or giving up interest. However, the truth may actually be of greater concern to some European diplomats. They don’t want to give up on Europe, they want to change it.
Both Rubio and Vance spoke of the UK and Europe as giving the US its beginning, “a sacred inheritance”.
Members of the Trump administration see the UK and Europe as a problem to fix on the grounds that they fear these policies could eventually threaten US security, and also act as a warning to many of the things they are concerned about now.
Justin Logan, director of defence and foreign policy studies at DC’s Cato Institute, said: “Their diagnosis of Europe is not dissimilar to their diagnosis of the United States. They’ve admonished Europe for restrictions on free speech, which was somewhat hampered by their own policies at home for the lady at Tufts University who wrote a bad op-ed and found herself taken into custody for it. So there’s some hypocrisy here.
“But basically what they say they think are the problems in Europe are quite similar to the problems that they think exist in the United States. So I don’t agree with the people who say, you know, Vance hates Europe or the administration hates Europe. They do want a fundamentally different relationship, but they want a relationship just the same.”
Maga figures see the UK and Europe as, in the words of one administration official, a “special project”. Administration staffers have made trips to the UK in recent months to meet with like-minded figures on the right. The Reform UK party maintains close links with senior Republicans, who ask with increasing excitement whether an election could be about to come and it be Nigel Farage’s turn.
It comes as the state department looks to change the culture as populist parties on the right gain ground across Europe. This includes plans to reorientate its foreign funding programme to think tanks closer aligned with their priorities. US state department officials have held talks about government funding with representatives of Maga-aligned think tanks as well as sister organisations of Britain’s Free Speech Union, led by Toby Young. The Conservative Heritage foundation in DC has been involved in suggesting groups.
Sarah Rogers, the US under secretary of state, has made freedom of speech a key part of her diplomacy brief, touring Europe to raise concerns and speak to figures impacted. Rogers tells The Sunday Times: “The state department has always engaged in grantmaking to advance American priorities. It should come as no surprise that freedom of expression is one of them. But we’re also supporting exchange programmes, arts and cultural events, archaeology and more.”
In Munich there was another show on display: the Democrats. Potential frontrunners for the 2028 nomination from Gavin Newsom to AOC (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) turned up to offer their own vision of what America’s relationship with the EU would look like in a few years. Newsom, the current favourite, tried to reassure them that this would all be over in three years as “Donald Trump is temporary”.
But in the time he’s been here, the world has already changed. The idea by the president’s critics that Trump’s exit from the White House could return the world to a liberal international order could prove wishful thinking.