One-third of Europeans do not trust Americans, says think tank survey

BERLIN - Thirty-two percent of Europeans no longer believed that Americans can be trusted after electing Donald Trump president in 2016, according to a pan-European survey of over 15,000 people in 11 countries published on Tuesday.

In Germany, 53 percent of respondents said that they strongly agreed or agreed that Americans can no longer be trusted after the 2016 election, the think tank European Council on Foreign Relations found in the survey.

The poll also found 36 percent of Swedish respondents did not believe Americans were trustworthy after 2016.

In addition, a total of 61 percent of respondents believed that the U.S. political system was "completely" or "somewhat" broken. Specifically, 81 percent of British, 71 percent of German and 66 percent of French respondents thought so.

Poland and Hungary were the two countries with the most positive views of the United States, with 56 percent of Hungarians and 58 percent of Poles saying the American political system works well or somewhat well, and only 23 percent of Poles and 19 percent of Hungarians did not trust Americans after voting for Donald Trump in 2016.

Most Europeans rejoiced at Joe Biden's victory in the November US presidential election, but they did not think he could help America make a comeback as a pre-eminent global leader.

Respondents evaluated the European Union and/or their own countries' systems much more positively than that of the United States and looked to Berlin rather than Washington as the most important partner.