Right-wing parties are simultaneously leading polls across Europe’s biggest economies in a first for the continent’s nationalist and populist movements.

In France, Germany, and the United Kingdom, known together as Europe’s “Big Three,” right-wing parties have surged in popularity on angst over lax immigration policies and high inflation, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The National Rally has led polls in France consistently for the past year, and National Rally’s presidential candidate would likely win the first round of voting. National Rally is led by Jordan Bardella, who took over the party after Marine Le Pen.

National Rally is already the largest single party in France’s National Assembly.

Reform UK, the newly founded British party led by Nigel Farage, has overtaken the ruling Labour Party in polls within the last six months. Farage founded the party partly out of frustration with the Conservative Party, which has dueled the Labour Party for control of government over the past century. Farage launched Reform after accusing Conservatives of abandoning their voters.

In Germany, Alternative for Germany, or AfD, has edged ahead of the ruling centrist Christian Democratic Union.

France, Germany, and the United Kingdom have, like the rest of Europe, gone through a period of high inflation after pandemic-era spending binges led to aggressively rising prices that have left many goods much at much higher price points than they were five years ago. Europe has also lagged behind the United States in economic growth that could offset the impact of those higher prices.

The governments of the Big Three have also faced increasing grassroots pressure over permissive immigration policies.

In France, citizens have reacted against the country’s growing Muslim population which many see as a threat to French values. The slogan “Let’s block everything” has grown popular on social media in France in reaction to unsustainable spending, in part on immigration that has little direct benefit for French citizens, that has led to austerity measures.

In Germany and the United Kingdom, both countries have experienced record waves of immigration in recent years. Germany’s foreign-born population has surged from 15% of its total population in 2017 to 22% last year.

The United Kingdom has seen raw immigration numbers comparable to the surge that swamped the United States immigration system under Biden within the same time frame. Unlike the United States, however, the United Kingdom’s population is about a fifth the size of the United States’.

Europe’s immigration policies have received attention and criticism from the United States, from high-profile figures such as Elon Musk to top officials in the White House.

“[G]overnment that puts foreigners above their own people is, by definition, TREASONOUS and ILLEGITIMATE!” Musk posted on X on Sunday. “The people of Britain deserve a government that represents their interests, not those of shadowy foreign organizations!”

Musk has also voiced support for AfD in Germany, while the Trump administration has criticized European officials for restricting free speech across the continent, often to avoid upsetting foreign populations that have swelled within its borders such as in Germany and the U.K.

President Donald Trump said Saturday that he will sign an executive order mandating voter I.D. for “Every Single Vote.”

Trump posted to Truth Social on Saturday evening that his executive order on voter I.D. would have “NO EXCEPTIONS!” He added that he would also take action to stop most voting by mail.

“Voter I.D. Must Be Part of Every Single Vote. NO EXCEPTIONS! I Will Be Doing An Executive Order To That End!!! Also, No Mail-In Voting, Except For Those That Are Very Ill, And The Far Away Military. USE PAPER BALLOTS ONLY!!!” the president posted.

Thirty-six states currently require some for of identification to be showed in order to vote, though that form differs by state. Of those 36, 25 require a photo ID while the other 11 do not specifically require photo identification. The remaining 14 states – which include deep blue states such as California, Illinois, and New York – do not require identification in order to vote on election day.

Trump earlier this month agitated against mail-in voting, promising to “lead a movement” to ban it. He also railed against “Highly ‘Inaccurate,’ Very Expensive, and Seriously Controversial VOTING MACHINES” in an August 18 post on his social media site, Truth.

“We are now the only Country in the World that uses Mail-In Voting. All others gave it up because of the MASSIVE VOTER FRAUD ENCOUNTERED,” he wrote at the time. “WE WILL BEGIN THIS EFFORT, WHICH WILL BE STRONGLY OPPOSED BY THE DEMOCRATS BECAUSE THEY CHEAT AT LEVELS NEVER SEEN BEFORE, by signing an EXECUTIVE ORDER to help bring HONESTY to the 2026 Midterm Elections.”

The president said that Democrats are “virtually Unelectable” without mail-in voting.

“ELECTIONS CAN NEVER BE HONEST WITH MAIL IN BALLOTS/VOTING, and everybody, IN PARTICULAR THE DEMOCRATS, KNOWS THIS,” he wrote.

In the 2024 election, roughly 30% of votes were cast by mail, according to the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. Most votes were cast in person, either during early voting or on the day of the election.

“The majority of voters in the 2024 general election cast their ballots in person, with 35.2% voting in person before Election Day and 37.4% voting in person on Election Day,” the commission wrote in a report on the 2024 election. “Mail voting comprised 30.3% of the turnout for the 2024 election, which is down from the high water mark for mail voting seen in 2020 (43%) but still larger than the percentage of the electorate that voted by mail in pre-pandemic elections.”