Labor PM Albanese re-elected in Australia; EU credits the ‘Trump effect’

Brussels – After Canada, Australia. Two historic US allies re-elected center-left parties to government precisely in an anti-Trump mood. In Canberra, outgoing Prime Minister Anthony Albanese staged a comeback and defeated the Coalition, the center-right liberal polity led by Peter Dutton, which paid for an excessive proximity to the American tycoon. From Brussels, European Council President António Costa said he was “convinced that our strategic and bilateral cooperation will continue to strengthen.” At the same time,  Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said, “Europeans and Australians are not just friends — we’re mates.”

Analysts have dubbed it the ‘Trump effect,’ already after Mark Carney’s victory in Canada, against all expectations that gave – until a few weeks before the vote – the leader of the Conservative Party, Pierre Poilievre, as the favorite. If in Ottawa, the April 28 election turned into a kind of referendum on the controversial US president and his threats of annexation, in Canberra, too, the Trump-driven tariff war seems to have played a decisive role, exacerbating an election campaign focused on cost of living and economic uncertainties. The United States has imposed reciprocal tariffs of 10 percent and 25 percent on steel and aluminum imports from Oceanic countries. Dutton, the Liberal Party of Australia leader who had called Trump “a great thinker,” paid the price, even losing the seat he had held since 2004.

Thus, if polls, before Trump took office, gave the Conservatives a lead of at least 10 percentage points, projections of election results overturn everything: in the lower house of the Australian Parliament, where the majority threshold is 76 seats, Albanese’s Labor secured at least 85 elected representatives, the Liberal Coalition not even 40. “Today, the Australian people voted for Australian values: for fairness, aspiration, and opportunity for all; for the strength to show courage in adversity and kindness to those in need,” the Italian-born premier said in his victory speech.

 Von der Leyen immediately appealed to Albanese, asking him to “seize this moment of stability to deepen our cooperation” to “expand trade, investment and work to promote our shared democratic values and a free, open Indo-Pacific.” On the other hand, clearly, Canberra, dependent on Washington primarily in the economic and security spheres, has no intention of cutting ties with the US administration. The prime minister announced today that he had a “warm and positive conversation” with Trump, expressing his intention to travel to the United States as his first foreign mission in his second term.

Congratulations to @AlboMP and his party on their victory in the Australian federal election.

Europeans and Australians are not just friends – we’re mates.

Let us seize this moment of stability to deepen our cooperation.

Together, we can expand trade, investment and work to…

– Ursula von der Leyen (@vonderleyen) May 3, 2025