The French president told six European news outlets that he wants Europe to raise joint debt, but getting allies on board will be tricky.
PARIS — French President Emmanuel Macron made an energetic appeal for Europe to launch a joint borrowing scheme and boost investment in strategic sectors, framing it as a economic necessity if the continent is to keep up with the United States and China.
In an interview with six European media outlets published Tuesday, Macron said Europe must seize on the unity it showed during its transatlantic rift with Washington over the Trump administration’s threat to annex Greenland.
“We think it’s over. But don’t believe it for a single second,” Macron said, arguing that Europe must continue to stand firm and united against any threats from the White House.
Macron predicted that Europe is going to need to get tough with Washington over European digital regulation and with Beijing as Chinese companies continue to flood Europe with cheap goods.
“The U.S. will, in the coming months — that’s certain — attack us over digital regulation,” Macron said.
Given Europe faces a constricted budget to confront those challenges, French president argued that to finance its future, it is “the moment to launch a common borrowing capacity, for these eurobonds for the future.”
Macron argued the moment was especially right with diminishing faith in the stability of the U.S. dollar.
“The global market … is more and more afraid of the American greenback. It’s looking for alternatives. Let’s offer it European debt,” he said.
Macron also denied in the interview that the long-troubled Future Combat Air System (FCAS) project between France, Germany and Spain was on the verge of collapse.
“I believe that things must move forward,” Macron said.
An Elysée official told reporters on Thursday that joint borrowing could cover sectors spanning from AI, to quantum, defense, space, semiconductors and robotics. The official said France could find allies in its call for more joint debt, arguing that Nordic countries could be open to that option when it comes to defense while southern countries would be interested in it to finance investments in new technologies.
“Europe today has become an adjustment market for China and an object of coercion for the United States,” said the same official. “If we stick to the traditional European recipes, we will see the acceleration of the slow death” foreseen by former Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi.
But it’s unclear how much traction the call will gain, given that Macron’s term ends next year and his influence is on the wane in Brussels.
EU leaders have in the past agreed on joint borrowing in extraordinary circumstances, such as to finance a loan for Ukraine and to help with the pandemic recovery. But a permanent facility for joint borrowing has long been viewed with skepticism by Europe’s frugal nations, who are worried about assuming the risks of highly indebted countries — like France itself.
Still, the French president is forging ahead with his sales pitch, which also includes enforcing European preference in public tenders and local content rules: first on Wednesday at a summit in Antwerp with European industry, then at an informal gathering of EU leaders on Thursday in the Belgian countryside.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, however, are pushing a much softer and less radical agenda.