Bullies always get what’s coming to them. It’s a universal truth. But here’s the thing about Donald Trump’s bullying approach when it comes to foreign policy, when the reckoning arrives, it will not be him or his cabinet suffering. It’ll be us. We, the people. Trump’s strategy, if you can call it that, is one of brute force, terrorist threats and nationalist bravado. He calls it strength, whereas the rest of the world calls it what it is, bullying, and in the long run, it will be the American people that will pay the price. Just take a look at the consequences that are already unfolding. Trump’s tactics have pushed away allies and driven competitors closer together. Take Latin America Trump just strong armed Colombia’s Gustavo Petro with threats of tariffs and sanctions, forcing compliance through economic pain, and that compliance wasn’t to do something that’s critical to the US. No, it was to force Colombia to take a few plane loads of immigrants. Come on, these short term wins come at a steep long term cost, resentment and a shift toward nations deemed to be our enemy, like China. In just the last year, China has increased its trade with Latin America by 16% while US trade with the region has stagnated. China, unlike Trump, offers economic partnerships without public humiliation, Mexico and Brazil are now negotiating trade deals with Beijing and Panama, a country Trump just threatened to invade, has doubled its economic ties with China. When you push people around, eventually they find new friends and the US. Well, we’re the ones that are left out in the cold. It’s not like Trump’s tariff tantrums are making us any richer. He slapped them on Colombia, threatened them on Canada and promised 25 to 100% tariffs on imports from BRICS, countries that is Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. Mind you, Brazil is one of our biggest agricultural trading partners. But here’s what Trump will not tell you, Americans pay those tariffs, not foreign governments. Remember his trade war with China? The cost to us consumers? Well, it was an additional $1,300 per household per year and the cost to American farmers a 40% drop in soybean exports and billions in lost revenue. Trump’s bullying does not just weaken foreign economies, it weakens our own. Even our friends are distancing themselves from us. Trump has openly mocked NATO, called European leaders weak, and even suggested that he might not defend certain allied countries if Russia were to attack this isn’t just reckless, it’s dangerously disrespectful. NATO isn’t just a security alliance. It’s a pillar of global stability. If Trump continues undermining it, we may find ourselves facing a future where Europe looks everywhere else than the US when it comes to leadership, they may even look to China. And if an emboldened Russia sees NATO as a fractured and ineffective entity, well, the consequences could be catastrophic, not just for Europe, but for us, national security. Speaking of national security, well, that was what one of the excuses that Trump used to justify his purported need to own Greenland. Yeah, Greenland. Trump wants to buy it as if it were a hotel on a Monopoly board. He also hinted at taking back the Panama Canal by force, and suggested that Canada should just go ahead and become our 51st state. Again, this isn’t strategy. It’s delusional and disrespectful. Instead of being a respected world leader, the US now looks like an unstable superpower ruled by a man playing empire builder, and the world has noticed at the UN multiple allies have questioned America’s commitment to global stability. A recent Pew Research survey found that confidence in us global leadership has plummeted in Europe, Latin America and Asia, Trump has made us a laughing stock across the globe. When the world stops taking us seriously, we don’t just lose respect, we lose economic leverage, diplomatic influence and ultimately, security. Bullies really like to pretend to be strong when they are clearly just insecure. And yeah, we know that bullies eventually get their due, but when the bully is the President of the United States, the blowback is collective. It’ll be our economy that is suffering when countries turn away from the US trade. It’s our national security that gets put at risk when allies distance themselves from us, and it’s our global standing that’s diminished when America becomes the world schoolyard tyrant instead of a trusted leader. Trump’s foreign policy isn’t America first. It’s America alone, and in the long run, that’s a losing game, because when a bully finally falls, no one.

On rushes to pick them back up