How Trump could impact EU-US science and technology relations

Donald Trump’s return to the White House has prompted some European research leaders to ask if they should seek out new scientific partners globally, including a rapprochement with China. 

The EU has spent several years trying to “de-risk” its research relationship with China, worried that it could be aiding Beijing with sensitive or even military technology. 

But Trump’s rhetoric towards Europe has some wondering whether the continent should better hedge its bets. The new US president has threatened to take over Greenland, which belongs to Denmark, and has not ruled out using force. Tariffs could also be on the cards. 

“What I now see and hear from the incoming US administration is not promising for this special relationship [between Europe and the US], which has existed for so many years,” said Robert-Jan Smits, president of the executive board of Eindhoven University of Technology. “It might force Europe to look for other partners to cooperate with,” he warned.

The EU is already contemplating a broader pivot following Trump’s entry into office. Earlier this week, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen responded to Trump’s inauguration by saying that the EU needed to “engage beyond blocs and taboos.” 

The first trip of her second term will be to India, von der Leyen told delegates at the World Economic Forum in Davos. Meanwhile, she spoke relatively warmly about China, saying she wanted to “engage and deepen our relationship” and “expand our trade and investment ties.” 

“India is an obvious partner,” said Smits. Eindhoven, which is a key player in the global semiconductor industry, has stepped up its recruitment, both of staff and students, from the country.

Trump’s rhetoric – threatening to take over Greenland through economic or military means, for example – also risks pushing Europe into reviewing its science cooperation policy with China, Smits said, although he stressed this should be “managed with great care, given the issue of knowledge security.” 

“It's a pity that the US is now also forcing us to look for other partners, for cooperation,” he said. 

US response

But any attempt by the EU to rekindle its scientific and technological relationship with Beijing could face an angry response in Washington. 

According to Robert Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, a US think-tank backed by many US tech companies, there are still areas where Brussels and Washington could cooperate. These include robotics, semiconductors, and the China-dominated rare earth magnets industry. But, he added, the Trump administration would be reluctant to cooperate with the EU if Brussels sought a rapprochement with China. 

“Until the EU decides it wants to stand tall and fight for freedom and stop attacking American companies, I don’t see why the US would want to strengthen partnerships,” he said. 

Trade and Technology Council

Under the previous US administration of Joe Biden, the EU set up a Trade and Technology Council (TTC) with the US, which tried to strike deals on everything from artificial intelligence to electric vehicle charging points, although its record was mixed. Brussels has also set up a TTC with India, focused on areas like digital governance and clean technology. 

The future of the EU-US TTC is now uncertain, but MEP Brando Benifei, chair of the European Parliament’s committee on US relations, is hopeful it can continue in some form. 

“The hints that I have gathered until now from exchanges with our American counterparts, members of Congress and US officials, show a willingness to keep this strand of work going and explore new ways forward for our collaboration in the field,” he said. 

Still, this collaboration may take on a very different form, one that is more on US terms, some fear. 

The EU’s continued reliance on the US military for defence against Russia, and for energy, limits the bloc’s ability to pivot away from Washington in research and technology policy, warned Tobias Gehrke, a senior policy fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations. 

“We are more dependent,” he said. “The defence industrial complex in Europe is just not ready.” 

Instead, European leaders are likely to “throw everything in with Trump” for continued US military protection, he said. Compared to Trump’s first term in 2017, when European leaders argued that the continent needed to build up its own military and technological strategic autonomy from the US, the atmosphere now was “submissive,” he said. 

The EU-US TTC was “dead” in its current form, he went on, but could be revived in a slimmed-down form focusing on denying China access to leading edge technologies, for example in AI. 

Washington has already sought to limit AI-focused semiconductor sales to Beijing, and pressured the Dutch company ASML into curbing exports of lithography machines needed to make chips. 

Offering to help the US in its technological rivalry with China could give Brussels an “in” with the new administration, said Gehrke. 

Executive orders

The dust is also still settling on a flurry of executive orders issued by Trump after he took office. 

Among the most significant for scientists is Trump’s decision to withdraw the US from the World Health Organisation (WHO), due to “onerous” payments compared to China. 

According to the WHO’s data for 2022-23, the US contributed $1.3 billion to the organisation, but China just $157 million. 

Trump’s executive order also criticised the WHO for its “inability to demonstrate independence from the inappropriate political influence of WHO member states.”

While Trump did not explicitly mention China, the WHO has been criticised for praising China’s initial response to the pandemic, even as Beijing has refused to share data that could help understand the origins of the virus. 

Risks progress

Still, the US withdrawal “risks progress on critical issues like pandemic preparedness and antimicrobial resistance,” said Pete Baker, a policy fellow at the Center for Global Development, a think tank based in Washington DC and London. 

However, the US contribution to the WHO is around 15% of the budget, he said, so could be plugged by other countries. 

In his executive order, Trump also withdrew the US from a global pandemic agreement currently being brokered by the WHO. This is actually the “bigger threat,” said Baker. “The political support of the US for the global health security architecture is irreplaceable,” he warned. 

Trump also scrapped swathes of executive orders from Biden, including one establishing a President's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, and another on artificial intelligence that, among other things, mandated testing for high-risk AI systems. 

Cuts coming?

It’s unclear just yet what Trump will mean for research budgets in the US. But there are signs he wants to lead a cost-cutting administration, and has established a so-called Department of Government Efficiency, led by tech billionaire Elon Musk. 

If cuts do come, this could hit US scientific collaboration overseas, said Atkinson. 

Foreign collaborations are typically an “extra” in university budgets, he said, meaning any cuts would have a disproportionate impact on them.