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, , , , , and many others for tuning into my live video! Join me for my next live video in the app.Hello everybody, and welcome to tonight's episode of Mary Trump Live. It's very good to be here with you.
I am not at Mary Trump Media Studios—also known as my other room. Nope, I'm somewhere else, but it's still good to be here.
Okay, lot going on. So let's start today.
Donald hosted leaders from five West African nations—Liberia, Senegal, Gabon, Mauritania, and Guinea-Bissau. He promised—because it means so much when Donald Trump promises things—a shift from US foreign aid to trade partnerships.
He emphasized Africa's economic potential, praising the continent's natural resources and people in stark contrast to derogatory comments he made during his first term.
While he wasn't derogatory today, he was still offensive—because he's him and he cannot be otherwise. But the fact that he dialed things back a little bit suggests that he wants something. This is what he had to say.
“Well, thank you. It's such good English. Such beautiful. Where did you learn to speak so beautifully? Where were you educated? Where? In Liberia? Yes, sir. Well, that's very interesting. It's beautiful English. I have people at this table can't speak nearly as well.”
I hate it when he talks about himself that way. Oh wow. Okay. Well, here's something that maybe he should have known ahead of time. Guess what the official language of Liberia is, Donald. It's English, you idiot.
But look at who he was talking to. He was talking to somebody from a country he considers a shithole nation. That's what Donald really thinks about people from Africa who happen to look different in a particular way. Everything this guy thinks—everything—is framed from the perspective of his deep, deep racism.
And again, I think it's important to make this distinction: Donald Trump isn't racist. He is a racist. He is a hardcore, unreconstructed racist who cannot fathom that somebody from Africa could speak English so beautifully.
He is incapable of doing anything other than talking down to leaders of smaller countries—especially countries in Africa.
But President Brice Oligui Nguema—please forgive my pronunciation, I apologize—he made a clear statement to the United States: if you won't invest in us financially, other countries will.
That is a message that people should have been giving to Donald all along, especially with this tariff nonsense and especially with the degree to which the United States has completely abdicated all responsibility to funding agencies like USAID, and failing miserably to use soft power—leaving a vacuum the size of China, perhaps, that could be filled. So take a look at the Guinea-Bissau President's statement through an interpreter:
“Our country is free, open to one and all. You are welcome to come and invest. Otherwise, other countries might come instead of you. Thank you.”
He also emphasized that they're not poor countries—they're rich in resources like raw materials. Despite Donald's condescension, which is repugnant, it is true.
These are countries that should be taken seriously or other countries—like China, with massive economies and a lot at stake—will take advantage of our failures to recognize an opportunity that would help us.
And instead, Donald continues with his, quite frankly, economically illiterate trade war games which threaten our economic future. He doesn't understand negotiation. He doesn't believe in negotiation. His way of negotiating is to say: this is my position, this is what I want, I want everything that I want, and I want you to have nothing. And he never moves off of that position.
Everything for him is and always has been a zero sum game. That does not work when it comes to global economics. It does not work when it comes to trade partnerships. It does not work when it comes to foreign policy, which requires statecraft, diplomacy.
The zero sum game approach, quite frankly, doesn't work for anything—not really. And yet, that is how Donald approaches every aspect of his life, and now his so-called job as President of the United States of America.
Okay, so while Donald was meeting to—I was going to say talk economics with African leaders—it was really more just to reveal what a repugnant racist he is and how completely ignorant he is, still to this day, about economic policies.
It turns out that he was preparing to threaten more countries through the mail. I think that's a felony.
Anyway, he built up this expectation that there was big news coming today, that he would be making seven trade announcements. And basically all we got were more letters.
So he essentially hyped as sweeping trade crackdowns the deals that he forced these countries to make—because he's such a tough guy. And instead, he just sent some letters about the tariffs to seven small countries, including Libya and Moldova.
He posted them earlier today on his failing social media site, saying that he was going to be hitting each country with 30% tariffs. Now these nations represent a tiny—like a minuscule—fraction of America's trade relationships.
Economists say that even this move though could worsen inflation and not help create American jobs. One letter invited countries to participate in the extraordinary economy of the United States—right after the countries had been threatened with sanctions.
Donald also claimed that we have trade balances with Brunei and Sri Lanka, and that these alleged trade imbalances are a national security threat. I'm not entirely sure how Sri Lanka—no offense to Sri Lanka—but I'm not entirely sure how Sri Lanka could pose a national security threat to the United States of America.
Anyway, meanwhile, he has taken no action against major trading partners like the EU or China. Just more bloviating. More smoke, no fire.
But there's more—because there always is.
In a stunning escalation—and this quite frankly came out of left field—Donald just imposed 50% tariffs on all Brazilian imports, explicitly citing as his reason prosecution of his ally, Jair Bolsonaro.
The letter, which was released at 4:00 PM, reads in part: “This trial should not be taking place. It is a witch hunt that should end immediately.” Yeah, because Brazil has every reason to listen to you, you psycho.
For context, Bolsonaro is being prosecuted for orchestrating a coup attempt to remain in power after losing the 2022 presidential election to Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Again, my apologies for my horrible pronunciation.
Sounds familiar. A coup attempt. We had one of those. Oh wait, no—you know what? We didn't have a coup attempt. We had a successful coup.
So no wonder Donald is on the side of the guy who did exactly the same thing he did—but had the great misfortune of living in a country, Brazil, that takes such things seriously and thinks that leaders who incite and engage in coups against their own government should be held accountable.
If only we had had a system of justice that was capable of such a thing.
So Donald might be trying to destroy our economy and our country. But thankfully, in some ways at least, the courts are acting as a last resort to stop him.
The Supreme Court—which is an institution, I have to be honest with you, I hold in such great contempt—it is a contempt that increases daily. But today, a rare win—an increasingly rare win—for immigration advocates.
When it comes to a controversial Florida law, it was recently passed targeting undocumented immigrants—preventing them, making it illegal for them to enter the state.
The law explicitly made it a felony for certain immigrants who enter Florida, and it was passed in tandem with Donald's immigration bans and illegal deportations to migrants.
And immigrant rights groups challenged the law, saying that the courts have been clear: this law is unconstitutional because immigration enforcement is a federal responsibility.
Well—not that that's working out very well—but it is true. The Supreme Court agreed with this reasoning, rejecting an emergency appeal from Florida to keep the law intact, leaving in place a lower court's pause on the law while it's being challenged.
Wish they had done that with some other rulings the Court has made recently, but that is a subject for another time.
Donald’s losing on immigration continues.
There was a split inside of Donald's foreign policy team. I would say it's unbelievable, but it's not—because it's Donald’s administration.
So it makes sense that a catastrophic screw-up like this would happen.
Basically, a high-stakes prisoner swap with Venezuela was derailed because they couldn't get their acts together.
Over 80 political prisoners and 11 Americans are still behind bars.
According to the New York Times, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Donald's envoy Richard Grenell pursued independently competing deals. They failed to coordinate, they failed to communicate, and they each offered different concessions to the Maduro regime.
Rubio backed a swap involving 250 Venezuelan migrants detained in El Salvador. Grenell offered oil access via Chevron.
So the confusion—which is to say, just breathtaking ineptitude—left both efforts failing and exposed the Trump regime’s willingness to use migrants as bargaining chips while denying they have any control over them.
Despite Caroline Leavitt's claim that the president has one team, Venezuelan officials said they didn’t know who actually spoke for Donald—and had a choice.
And therefore, why should any foreign country at this point trust anybody within the Trump regime, including and especially Donald Trump himself?
All right. On that note—and we shouldn't trust them either, by the way—it’s been a long day.
