It Will Take Decades To Repair the Damage Donald Trump Is Doing Right Now

Listen To This Story

Assuming that he serves out his term, we are now two-fifths through Donald Trump’s second stint in the White House. To be precise, it’s 40.24640657 percent over, but who’s counting?

Well, the rest of the world, for starters.

Ironically, most of America’s traditional adversaries are least affected by the havoc Trump is wreaking every day, and some of them, like Russia and North Korea, are arguably better off because of it.

On the one hand, that’s because the US president is corrupt and a budding authoritarian, which means that other kleptocrats and despots know how to appeal to him and/or how to grease the wheels to get things done when dealing with his administration. 

More importantly, however, their ties to the US were already limited, so the impact of Trump’s tariffs or other rash decisions is extremely small.

Of course, that doesn’t mean that they, or any other world leader, can rest easy — because they could find themselves on the receiving end of the president’s unpredictability and insatiability. 

Just ask the emir of Qatar, who found out that even if one day you bribe Trump with a plane and some business opportunities for his family, the next he’ll still light your economy on fire with an ill-advised war against one of your neighbors.

For the same reason that America’s adversaries are largely insulated (or benefit) from the chaos the president sows, its allies are impacted the most. 

Or, to be accurate, its former allies — because the US is quickly running out of friends and is instead viewed as a rival or worse.

According to a recent poll, nearly a quarter of Britons believe that the US is the greatest long-term threat to global peace, which means it ranks second only to Russia. 

Next door in the European Union, America’s image is just as bleak. 

When Trump took office, there wasn’t a single EU country in which the US was seen as more of an adversary than an ally. Now, that is the prevailing opinion in some of the bloc’s biggest countries — e.g., Germany, France, Spain, and Italy — where fewer than 10 percent of people view America as an ally.

Once again, in the name of accuracy, we should say “Trump’s America” because the same poll also shows that, while they overwhelmingly believe that the current occupant of the White House is harming the relationship between the continent and the US, Europeans generally think that this damage can be repaired when he leaves office.

Boy, are they wrong! 

To understand just how wrong, we only have to look to the north across Lake Ontario America.

Realizing that Canada’s interests are not best served by holding its collective breath every four years to see whether voters in Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania will once again entrust the reins of the US to a mentally ill grifter, Prime Minister Mark Carney has embarked on a mission to decouple the fortunes of his country from those of its neighbor.

His efforts to ensure that Canada’s economy is never again dependent on the whims of a lunatic have already borne fruit — and proven to be very popular. 

Carney is working hard to forge new trade alliances across the globe to reduce his country’s reliance on the US as its main customer, and Canadians are rewarding his efforts of standing up to Trump with approval ratings that the US president and other leaders who are cowering before him can only dream of.

Since it stands to reason that those other presidents, prime ministers, and chancellors also like to be popular, some of them may also try a harder line in the future — especially in light of how much people in their countries loathe Trump. 

As a result, when the dust settles on January 20, 2029, there is a good chance that the world’s trade landscape will look quite different to the US’s detriment because its former allies are looking for more stable partners. 

And, regardless of who is sworn in next, it’ll stay that way, no matter how those Europeans feel who believe things will go back to normal. 

It’s easy to see why: Imagine that the US is an incredibly popular restaurant with a long history of being a staple in its neighborhood. One day, this thriving eatery is taken over by a new owner who proceeds to insult his patrons and instructs his cook to spit in their food.

How long do you think it will take those customers to take their business elsewhere? And once they do, many of them will not come back once the ownership changes again. 

It’s like that with the trade relationships that Trump is ruining now. At this point, it is impossible to tell how much damage he is doing to companies that want to do business abroad but it will be significant. 

Of course, the harm the president is inflicting on the international stage is not limited to trade. Trump and his administration are also weakening NATO, the United Nations, and other institutions. 

And let’s not forget the more direct impact that foreign aid cuts have had on populations in need. By some estimates, they will cost millions of lives in the form of preventable deaths over the next five years alone — many of them children.

How do you think the people in those countries will feel about the US when that happens?

Speaking of kids, one of the things that made America a leader in science and technology is that it was always able to attract the best and brightest from around the globe with top-ranked universities and the opportunities that awaited those who graduated from them. 

Under Trump and his administration’s harsh immigration policies, however, foreign student enrollment is plunging.

Again, these are not just things that will miraculously return to the state of affairs before Trump took office.

And that’s just the chaos he has caused on the international stage. 

Next week, we will examine the lasting and destructive impact his presidency has had domestically, and why it will take years to reverse the damage he has done.