Trump voices video support for far right at rally in Spain
MADRID — Former U.S. President Donald Trump threw his weight behind Spain’s far right Sunday in a video shown at a rally in Madrid that also featured messages by the leading stars of Europe’s populist right such as Italy’s Giorgia Meloni and Hungary’s Viktor Orban.
In a recording that lasted under 40 seconds made while Trump was on a plane, Trump thanked Spain’s far-right Vox party and its leader, Santiago Abascal, for what he called the “great job” they do.
“We have to make sure that we protect our borders and do lots of very good conservative things,” Trump said. “Spain is a great country and we want to keep it a great country. So congratulations to Vox for so many great messages you get out to the people of Spain and the people of the world.”
Vox captured national attention on Spain’s political landscape in 2019 when it became the third-largest force in Spain’s Parliament after an election that led to a national left-wing coalition that still holds power. Vox’s messages include zero tolerance for Catalan separatism, disdain for gender equality, diatribes against unauthorized immigration from Africa and embracing both the “Reconquista” of medieval Spain from Islam as well as the legacy of Gen. Francisco Franco’s 20th-century dictatorship.
Abascal returned the flattery when he took to the stage after more video messages by European and South American right-wing politicians and an in-person speech by Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki.
“My thanks for President Donald Trump, a visionary in the fight for sovereign nations, a visionary in the fight for secure borders, who has had to suffer (attacks) from the most powerful establishment in the world and the largest media attack that any world leader has had to face in recent memory,” Abascal told the crowd.
The party led by Abascal failed to meet the expectations it set for itself in regional contests this year and had suffered its first serious bout of in-fighting among its leaders. Vox is now eyeing regional and municipal elections next year.
The rally came weeks after Abascal and the rest of Europe’s far-right celebrated the victory of Meloni’s neo-fascist Brothers of Italy Party.
The win by Meloni has worried European Union leaders that Italy, the bloc’s third-largest economy, could put national interests first, like Hungary and Poland are doing.
Vox and its supporters are hoping that Meloni’s surge in Italy can spill over to Spain.
Trump and others leading figures of the world’s popular right have been trying for years to weave together networks of support in what they describe as a winner-take-all struggle against the political left.
The Vox rally also featured video appearances by former Colombian President Alvaro Uribe, Chilean right-wing politician Jose Antonio Kast, the daughter of former Bolivian interim President Jeanine Anez, and U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz.