The Dutch Trump's Challenge to Holland's Liberalism

Geert Wilders' right-wing populism relies on nasty attacks against Muslims and other minorities

Geert Wilders. Shutterstock. Dutchmen Photography.

Mark Rutte, the Netherlands’ prime minister since 2010, is unfailingly upbeat and optimistic: he rides a bicycle to official meetings and personifies the sober-minded and moderate country that until last November’s parliamentary elections Holland was keen to project to the rest of the world. Geert Wilders, the man attempting to replace Rutte as prime minister after his Freedom Party (PVV) secured the most seats in the elections, represents a massive shift away from the pro-European Union, liberal democratic openness that has characterized the Netherlands during Rutte’s tenure, and towards an anti-immigration nationalism consistent with far right populist movements around the world.

Since Wilders’ PVV did not win decisively enough to form a government on its own—its 37 seats, while the most of any party, was 39 seats shy of a majority, the threshold needed to govern—it engaged in talks with Dilan Yeşilgöz’s People’s Party for Freedom and Democracy (24 seats), Pieter Omtzigt’s New Social Contract (20 seats), and Caroline van der Plas’ Farmer-Citizen Movement (7 seats) in an effort to form a ruling coalition. Those plans hit a massive wall when, on Feb. 6, Omtzigt abruptly ended talks with Wilders’ PVV due to differences over how to manage the nation’s finances. No one knows what will happen next—for example, in light of talks breaking down between Wilders and his would-be coalition partners, former European Union Commissioner Frans Timmermans, whose Green-Labor alliance is in second place with 25 seats, could be given a chance to arrange a majority coalition. Whether Wilders eventually succeeds in forming a government or not, the fact that an election in which Dutch voters were effectively selecting a new prime minister for the first time in a decade and a half went his way, and that his support has only seemed to grow since then, is very troubling for the prospects of multicultural pluralism in Holland. One poll from early February found that if the election were held now Wilders’ PVV would win 50 votes, 13 more than it won in November.

The Dutch Trump

To understand how Wilders is a threat to Holland as we know it, consider how he is like—and unlike—the American populist firebrand he is often compared to: Donald Trump.

Wilders shares Trump’s penchant for inflammatory nativist rhetoric. Though Trump’s anti-immigrant attacks are more panoramic (targeting Muslims but also characterizing Mexican migrants as “rapists,” African and Central American nations as “shithole countries,” etc.), no major politician anywhere has exhibited greater anti-Muslim animus than Wilders. Trump’s travel ban against Muslim-majority countries—a policy he is pledging to reup if re-elected—is actually one-upped by Wilders’ proposals for: a tax on head scarfs, a ban on minarets and the Quran, and, a la Trump, a complete halting of immigration from Muslim countries. Infamously, Wilders was convicted of insulting a “particular people” and inciting discrimination against it after leading a chant for “fewer Moroccans”—who comprise a mere 2% of the Dutch population (an appeals court later upheld his conviction for insulting Moroccans but overturned his conviction for incitement). Wilders has described the Muslim faith as “the ideology of a retarded culture,” and peddled the Islamophobic trope that “moderate Islam” doesn’t exist. He has also likened the Quran to Adolf Hitler’s Mein Kampf. 

Also like Trump, Wilders often harnesses populist sentiment in the service of his political objectives. Much like Trump’s “Make America Great Again” is predicated on the recovery of an America that was culturally, politically, and demographically more congenial to white Americans, and contemptuous of the strides various others have made, Wilders frequently characterizes Dutch society as serving everyone’s interests except its real citizens, who are more admirable and virtuous than the others. “I want my Netherlands back!” declared Wilders last year, in a key similar to Trump’s MAGA. He then rattled off all the ills afflicting Holland today: “A country full of asylum profiteers, woke-crazies, climate nutters, Arabs, non-binaries, farmer haters, and quinoa chewers.” Why has this message gained purchase in Holland given the egalitarian self-image of the Dutch? Because in recent decades a cleavage has developed in Dutch politics where the cosmopolitan ethos associated with the Hague has become the preserve of the higher and middle classes and is seen as disconnected from the values and ideas of the working class—the average Joes of society—or “Henk” and “Ingrid” in Wilders’ Dutch rendering). Often quite like Trump, Wilders exploits this division. 

Wilders also shares Trump’s penchant for confrontational politics delivered in an insulting, demeaning register. He is quite comfortable matching Trump’s willingness to provoke and vilify his opposition, such as when he repeatedly referred to a government colleague as a “witch,” or when he tweeted out a photoshopped picture of a political rival marching with Hamas in favor of Sharia Law in the Netherlands. Like Trump, he’s a climate skeptic; he’s in favor of implementing a draconian law and order regime; he supports moving the Dutch embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. On this last issue, Wilders is well-beyond even Trump: He cartoonishly touts a pro-Israel one-state “solution” to ending the Israel-Palestine conflict by forcibly relocating Palestinians to Jordan, which he favors renaming “Palestine.”

Finally, Trump and Wilders are lockstep in their foreign policy stances. Trump is an “America First” critic of postwar global institutions and international norms; Wilders’ PVV’s election platform, which explicitly echoes Trump, denotes that its “guiding principle” is: “Act in the interests of the Netherlands and the Dutch. Our own country comes first.” Taking his cue from Brexit, Britain’s high-profile withdrawal from the European Union, Wilders has called for a “Nexit.” He even cut one of the stars off a European flag as a public demonstration of his wish that the Netherlands would leave the E.U. A committed Euro-skeptic, Wilders wants Holland’s complete independence from the European Union’s migration policy, shared currency, and international obligations. Whereas the Netherlands’ current government has pledged over Є2 billion in aid this year for Ukraine’s ongoing resistance effort against Russia’s brutal invasion, Wilders said he would not send Kyiv any more money or weapons, resources he thinks would be better used to build the Netherlands’ own army. 

Wilders’ Uniqueness

But although it’s tempting to fully equate the two—their bouffant blonde hair basically inviting it—there are key differences between Trump and Wilders. There are limits to the “EuroTrump” motif, to quote the title of a well-known documentary about him. 

One: Wilders is Holland's most experienced parliamentarian, first elected way back in 1998. Far from being in the mold of a populist outsider who uses his lack of familiarity with the political process as a selling point, Wilders is an expert at parliamentary procedure, a deft handler of the classic Dutch parliamentary tactics of interruption and inquiry. Wilders is also widely acknowledged to be one of Holland's most proficient debaters. This means that, unlike Trump, Wilders is first and foremost a politician.

Two: While Trump is a political opportunist whose entire agenda revolves around his boundless narcissism and whose approach to policy is to take positions that’ll get him the most attention, power, and acclaim, Wilders is an ideologue at heart. His deeply held revulsion toward Islam, for example, is neither borne of political calculation nor meaningfully subject to the normal push and pull of political negotiation. In fact, up until the last electoral cycle, Wilders time and again preferred to languish on the margins of political power rather than give up or even soften his Islamophobia. Though he has recently made an attempt at political respectability—and in so doing earned the sobriquet “Geert Milders” (Geert the Mild)—it’s a mirage. He remains deeply committed to the position that Islam is a major threat to Dutch society. “Mild,” after all, is a relative not an absolute term: though Wilders has withdrawn his 2018 legislative proposal that called for mosques and the Quran to be banned, merely conceding that Islam should be allowed to exist in society doesn’t automatically mean he should be perceived as some sort of reasonable moderate. Wilders remains every bit the anti-Islam ideologue he’s been for decades. Trump, while sharing Wilders’ distaste for Muslim immigration, remains ideologically malleable in a way Wilders could never be.

The Netherlands ≠ The United States

Finally, Wilders and Trump operate in two very different political systems. In the U.S., a two-party dominated, winner-take-all presidential election model means whoever wins the presidency holds the levers of executive power. The Netherlands, a constitutional monarchy, relies on a proportional representational model for determining which party’s head will hold executive power. But once a party wins, as Wilders’ PVV did in last November’s elections, the leader of the party usually has to strike arrangements with other, smaller parties in order to form a government. This requires concessions from the presumptive prime minister and limits his or her power when governing. Under the U.S. model, by contrast, Wilders would need to modify or concede anything only if he wants to get his legislative agenda enacted by Congress. But if his goal is to grandstand rather than legislate, he can do so without facing a vote of no confidence.

The history of Dutch politics is largely the history of glacial coalition-formation. This process has only intensified in recent years. Traditionally, large parties dominated parliament; today, those larger entities have fractured into numerous smaller, and more fleeting, niche parties. Instead of large Christian Democratic and Labor parties, there are smaller ones catering specifically to immigrants, libertarian entrepreneurs, far right extremists, and even, quite literally, to animals—as in the case of the Partij voor de Dieren (Party for the Animals) which defends animal rights. While a fractured landscape of this sort might at first seem like it would facilitate coalition formation, in fact the loss of the older cross-party relations among larger entities has made the Dutch tradition of coalition politics more precarious. Coalitions take longer to form now—and the allegiances are less secure. In many ways, Wilders' rise is a product of these more volatile recent dynamics in the Dutch political system. And his inability to form a coalition is partly the result of the same dynamics.

Why Wilders?

Why Wilders, and why now? While right-wing populism had not historically been a notable part of the Dutch political landscape, the assassination of Pim Fortuyn, a far- right populist politician, in 2002 changed all that. In the aftermath, parties catering to previously inactive and disgruntled voters proliferated. 

Even more proximately, in the months preceding the 2023 elections, two new parties arose in swift succession from problems in Rutte's cabinet, one over forcing farmers to meet certain environmental standards, the second over an appallingly mishandled pursuit of alleged cases of child support fraud. As the leaders of these new parties struggled with the political spotlight, voters disaffected by these scandals migrated further right into Wilders' camp. This both fed off and further bolstered the idea that populist movements were gaining ground and could exceed past electoral performances. 

The Oct. 7 attacks, and especially demonstrations against Israel’s response, may have helped Wilders PVV by bringing to the national consciousness themes very favorable to his platform. Wilders himself believes this was one of two key factors to his party’s victory (the other being immigration).

Other issues that may have steered voters in the PVV’s direction include: rising inflation and cost of living, a housing crisis (which Wilders notoriously blamed on “a tsunami of migrants”), and rising energy costs associated with the European Union’s response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Where Does Holland Go From Here?

The process to form a ruling coalition began right after the election. In Holland’s three-tiered process, the first step involved appointing an extra-parliamentary "explorer" (verkenner) tasked with specifying each party's coalition preferences. Next, the parliament appointed an "informer" (informateur) with the specific mandate to bring together parties for a majority coalition. In the final stage, a "former" (formateur)⎯usually the prime minister-designate⎯is appointed to hash out last details and finalize ministerial appointments. The talks between Wilders and his would-be coalition partners broke down during the “informer” stage.

If Wilders manages to resume talks with them, or arrange a coalition with a different set of parties, or find another way to inch closer to the premiership (if no ruling coalition is formed a new election may be called), it will, at the minimum, be a huge challenge to the multicultural, pluralistic, European Netherlands. Perhaps the exigencies of coalition politics would temper his worst excesses but Netherlands will have to grapple with his dark alternative for the country for a long time.

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