Trump’s warm words for strongmen set off alarms
The deal-making president appears to be buttering up totalitarian leaders with long records of human rights abuses. By Annie Karni
| 05/01/17 06:12 PM EDT http://www.politico.com/story/2017/05/01/trump-duterte-dictators-white-house-237848He has extended a White House invitation to Filipino president Rodrigo Duterte, a leader who has defended the assassination of journalists and condoned extrajudicial killings in the name of his war on drugs.
In multiple interviews, President Donald Trump has also heaped praise on North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, calling him a “smart cookie,” and saying he would be “honored” to meet with him under the right circumstances.
And the president who prides himself on upending political norms called Turkey’s authoritarian president Recep Tayyip Erdogan to congratulate him on winning a referendum that will allow him to continue his autocratic rule over the country.
Trump's warm rhetoric toward totalitarian leaders is a sharp break from the presidents before him. It’s reflective of a commander in chief naturally impressed by blunt displays of power and influence, sensitive to shows of disrespect, who is still processing his own shock victory in the 2016 election, and who has no diplomatic experience on the world stage.
But foreign policy experts — particularly those who served in the Obama administration — said his kind words for the strongmen of the world also carry serious repercussions for America’s standing as the leader of the free world.
“We’ve always had relationships with governments that are problematic, but we hold them accountable on it and we don’t lavish them with praise this way,” said Ilan Goldenberg, a former State Department official under John Kerry who now serves as a senior fellow at the Center for a New American Security.
SNIP
