DURING the economic crash in 2008, it was often said that when the US sneezes, the world catches a cold. It is true of economics, where decisions made thousands of miles away can have a very real impact on every one of us, and it is true of politics.

It’s one of the reasons why so many people involved in politics spend so much time reading about, talking about and thinking about what is happening across the Atlantic.

This year, with the presidential election only a matter of months away, the voters’ decision may have an ever more profound role than usual in shaping the future of the world around us.

There are some issues and themes for the US election which are already familiar across Europe – from reproductive rights to the unchecked power of the super-rich, and from the climate emergency to the international response to the genocide in Gaza.

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But the dangerous agenda of Donald Trump, his VP nominee JD Vance, and the wider Republican Party is much broader than a simple set of election issues. It is clearer than ever that democracy itself is on the ballot.

Trump is a criminal candidate who has attempted to overturn an election result. He is backed by members of a corrupt billionaire class, some of whom have openly said they no longer believe democracy is compatible with their version of “freedom”.

The public movement he has cultivated is very much in line with global movements that have promoted far-right parties elsewhere, like the National Rally in France, the AfD in Germany and Nigel Farage’s (below) Reform here.

(Image: PA)

Watching footage of the Republican convention was a horrible experience. Speaker after speaker spouting some of the most extreme hatred and bile imaginable while launching attacks on every vulnerable minority community they could think of.

It would be catastrophic for our world – and for our climate – if Trump was back in the White House and these people were back in power.

The Muslim ban. The anti-migrant wall. Locking up children in cages. Cosying up to Putin. Ripping up international climate agreements. A world run for the billionaires. This is what Trump represents.

The vile and racist politics that he would bring back would once again inflict misery, pain and chaos on the lives of vulnerable people and fuel the most bigoted and reactionary forces in the US and beyond.

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A Trump White House would not just hold back global climate action, it would derail it altogether. That’s what he did last time when he pulled the US out of the Paris climate treaty and rolled back on almost every area of environmental spending and regulation.

Trump and many of the people in his orbit don’t just ignore climate change; they actively promote climate denial conspiracies and empower the worst polluters.

When the US backs away from its commitments, it impacts the global drive for change and gives a green light for other leaders to do the same.

In the UK, before he was Foreign Secretary, David Lammy branded him a “neo-Nazi-sympathising sociopath” when in opposition, but now talks about working together.

A lot has changed since Trump left office in 2020. We now know even more about his dodgy business dealings, which have been repeatedly found to be fraudulent. There are even big questions about the business he has done here in Scotland.

In February of this year, the New York State Supreme Court found Trump and his businesses guilty of civil fraud, ordering defendants to pay more than $450 million. They were found to have falsely inflated the value of Trump’s assets, including his golf course in Aberdeen.

That is why I have called for the Scottish Government to update MSPs about what action is being taken to investigate Trump (below) here in Scotland. I hope that other governments are doing the same.

None of this is to offer any illusions about the Democratic Party or Joe Biden.

The outgoing president will be leaving a very mixed legacy. There is no doubt that he has taken some positive steps and undone some of the damage of the Trump administration, but he has not gone anywhere near far enough and has not made anywhere near the scale of structural change required.

Any reflections on his time in office must also confront his ongoing complicity in Israel’s genocidal assault on Gaza, and the shameful role he has played in fuelling it. He has been one of the most pro-Israel US presidents ever, and even the brutal collective punishment of Gaza’s population has done nothing to change that.

He has continued to arm, support and bolster Israeli forces while tens of thousands of civilians have been killed, creating one of the worst humanitarian catastrophes in the world and inflicting some of the most grotesque war crimes of this century.

Kamala Harris is being urged by many in her own party to commit to ending the US’s role in the war and doing everything they can to bring it to a halt.

There must also be an immediate focus on tackling the vast poverty and inequality that is so prevalent across the US. It is the wealthiest society that the world has ever seen, and yet there are still millions of people without health insurance and many more dying from totally preventable causes.

The best way that the Democrats can stop Trump is by moving away from a broken status quo and offering a bold and positive alternative that can bring the genuine and transformative change that so many are crying out for.