Semafor Signals
How a second Trump presidency could impact global affairs
Insights from Foreign Affairs, The Washington Post, Politico
The News
A New York jury found ex-US President Donald Trump guilty of all 34 counts against him in a hush-money trial, marking the first time a former or serving American president has been convicted of a crime.
The Republican frontrunner for November’s presidential election could return to the White House for a second term, and Thursday’s verdict has bolstered his base. Elsewhere, world leaders are preparing for what a second Trump presidency could mean for international politics.
Coverage about the verdict has plastered North American and European news sites — but it is noticeably absent from some international front pages, including The Times of India, Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post, Singapore’s The Strait Times, and The Global Times, a state-affiliated newspaper in China.
SIGNALS
‘America first’ policies could impact world order
Trump reached the White House last time in part due to his “America first” policies, which centered the US in decision-making and deprioritized Washington’s role on the world stage. A second Trump presidency would likely see the same policies enacted again, Hal Brands, a global affairs professor at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, wrote in Foreign Affairs. “The results would not be pretty,” he wrote. A US-centered foreign policy would also mean a “more vicious and chaotic” world. Countries like Ukraine, which rely heavily on US intervention, would suffer. But the US itself “might not do so badly—at least for a while,” he added.
Israel, Russia could welcome Trump’s return
Some nations may be eager for Trump to return to office. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu “benefited immensely from Trump’s first term, [and] is arguably hoping for a similar dividend in the event of a second,” The Washington Post’s Ishaan Tharoor wrote in the paper’s Today’s WorldView newsletter. He’s not the only world leader that would welcome another Trump presidency: Russian President Vladimir Putin, too, would benefit. Trump has previously supported a peace plan between Ukraine and Russia that would cede some territory to Moscow, a key objective of Putin’s. “It would cement the Republican turn away from Europe’s security at a time when Western resolve around Ukraine is flagging,” Tharoor wrote.
Trump allies rush to his defense
Some right-wing politicians in Europe have already thrown their support behind Trump following his guilty verdict. In Hungary, Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, long a supporter of the former president, called Trump a “man of honour” who “commanded respect around the world and used this respect to build peace.” In Italy, Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini said that Trump was a “victim of judicial harassment.” Moscow, too, rallied behind Trump: On Friday, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov claimed that the guilty verdict was evidence that the White House is “eliminating its political rivals by all possible legal and illegal means.”
