The End of American Credibility

Donald has turned the United States from a democratic leader into a nation feared by allies, embraced by authoritarians, and trusted by no one.

Photo Credit: Fox News

Former French ambassador Gérard Araud warned that the Trump regime has turned the United States into an unreliable ally. At this point, that feels less like a warning and more like a statement of fact. The damage has already been done.

Former Swedish Prime Minister Carl Bildt described Donald’s foreign policy as “a wrecking ball” aimed directly at the postwar international order. At the 2026 Munich Security Conference, European leaders openly questioned whether the United States could still be trusted as the anchor of the Western alliance, a question Donald has answered repeatedly over the last sixteen months.

One senior European diplomat reportedly described the Trump regime as “the greatest threat to transatlantic stability in decades.”

Meanwhile, Donald insists the exact opposite is true,

A year ago, our country was an embarrassment and all over the world they laughed at us and they don’t laugh anymore. They are not laughing anymore.

A year ago Donald was already in the Oval Office, so yes, there was plenty of reason for the world to laugh at the United States of America because seventy eight million Americans decided it was somehow a good idea to put him back in power.

Things have become far too dangerous for that. The rise of fascism in the United States, the abandonment of our alliances, and the corruption and incompetence of the Trump regime have fundamentally altered the way the rest of the world sees us.

According to a Spring 2025 Pew Research Center survey conducted across twenty four countries, only thirty four percent of respondents had confidence in Donald to do the right thing in world affairs. Sixty two percent did not. Eighty percent described him as arrogant. Sixty five percent described him as dangerous. Only twenty eight percent described him as honest.

And it has only deteriorated further.

In April 2026, Gallup released the results of its annual world poll spanning more than one hundred and thirty countries. For the first time in nearly two decades, China surpassed the United States in global approval ratings. The United States is now viewed less favorably than China for the first time since the George W. Bush administration. That should terrify us.

The Munich Security Conference described the era ushered in by the Trump regime as a “demolition man” period, one in which the pillars of Pax Americana, the stability that largely defined the postwar West, have begun to collapse.

The damage to America’s reputation is undeniable.

European Council President António Costa warned that Europe must protect itself not only from adversaries, but from allies who challenge it. It was obvious who he meant.

A March 2026 Politico European Pulse survey found that only twelve percent of respondents across six major European Union nations still considered the United States a close ally. Thirty six percent viewed the United States as a threat, more than the twenty nine percent who viewed China as a threat.

As with everything Donald touches, the numbers keep moving in the wrong direction.

And nowhere has the deterioration been more obvious than in America’s relationship with Canada.

After Donald repeatedly threatened Canadian sovereignty by referring to Canada as America’s “51st state” and mockingly calling the Canadian prime minister a “governor”, Prime Minister Mark Carney responded with words that would have been unthinkable only a few years ago.

This is what Mark Carney had to say:

The foundations of the international order, the order which Canada helped to build and from which we have long benefited, that order is crumbling and many of our former strengths built on our close ties to the United States have become our weaknesses. The US has changed. That’s their right and we are responding. That is our imperative.

America has changed, and our allies are adjusting accordingly.

Canadian travel to the United States dropped sharply in 2025, resulting in billions of dollars in lost tourism revenue and threatening tens of thousands of jobs. Polling also showed Canadian views of the United States reaching their lowest levels since researchers began tracking the issue more than two decades ago.

Prime Minister Carney has already begun pursuing new trade agreements with Europe, India, and China specifically to reduce Canada’s dependence on the United States. Canadian businesses are increasingly looking elsewhere because they no longer see America as stable or reliable.

And honestly, why would they?

There is perhaps some possibility that once Americans reject the fascism we have empowered and recommit ourselves to building the kind of multicultural democracy we should have been all along, some of this damage can be repaired.

But the more likely outcome is that it cannot be repaired.

After putting Donald in the Oval Office twice and handing Republicans control of all three branches of government, there is very little reason for other nations to trust us. The consequences of that betrayal may last for generations.

Since returning to power, the Trump regime has withdrawn the United States from dozens of international organizations, undermined NATO, threatened allies with tariffs and territorial aggression, sided repeatedly with Russia over Ukraine at the United Nations, and destabilized long standing diplomatic relationships around the globe.

At the Munich Security Conference, Senator Lindsey Graham was asked about Donald’s threats toward Greenland. This is how he responded.

So here’s what I tell my European friends. Greenland is behind us, but the goal is to get outcomes. Who gives a shit who owns Greenland? I don’t.

I suspect Greenland cares. Denmark certainly cares. NATO cares. Russia absolutely cares.

And the fact that somebody as weak and pathetic as Lindsey Graham attempts to posture this way only highlights how dangerous and unserious these people truly are.

Greenland belongs to Greenland and Denmark. That is not going to change unless Donald becomes even more emboldened by his lawlessness and by his disastrous war of choice against Iran, which we are currently losing. And because Donald consistently mistakes recklessness for strength, that possibility cannot simply be dismissed.

The collapse accelerated after the February 28th United States and Israeli airstrikes on Iran. Iran responded by closing the Strait of Hormuz, through which roughly twenty percent of the world’s oil and gas supply passes.

Nearly every major NATO ally refused to participate in the conflict, both because the war itself was reckless and because the United States failed to consult them beforehand.

Spain denied access to military bases jointly operated with the United States. Italy blocked the use of a major base in Sicily. France denied overflight clearance for military flights. Poland refused to move Patriot missile systems to the Middle East.

Donald responded by calling NATO allies cowards and announcing the withdrawal of thousands of American troops from Germany, making absolutely nobody safer.

Meanwhile, China continues expanding its influence across telecommunications, infrastructure, artificial intelligence, and global supply chains. But the larger concern is not merely economic dominance. It is the spread and normalization of authoritarian governance itself.

For decades, the United States claimed to stand for democratic norms, civil liberties, free expression, and the rule of law. But as the Trump regime weakens those institutions at home while alienating democratic allies abroad, authoritarian systems gain legitimacy.

And this is how democratic decline actually happens.

It is rarely immediate collapse. It is normalization.

People become accustomed to corruption. They become accustomed to grift, incompetence, politicized law enforcement, and attacks on democratic institutions until eventually they stop believing there is any alternative. That is the Trump regime’s real agenda.

They want Americans exhausted. They want us demoralized. They want us to stop believing a better future is possible because people who lose faith are infinitely easier to control. And that may be the most dangerous thing of all.