We await news on Iran. US involvement in the Middle East has gone so well in the past… but in terms of what we do know, Trump’s presidency had hit a new low at the start of 2026. Let’s look at four actions that truly appal:
A rogue President in action…
- The invasion of Venezuela. No moral purpose to removing the illegitimate, thoroughly corrupt Maduro. Simply a blatant oil grab setting a precedent for dictators and wannabe dictators to invade at will. Only belatedly has Trump even acknowledged his ‘competitor’ for the Nobel peace prize, María Corina Machado, by far a more legitimate successor to Maduro than the his corrupt underlings who Trump is happy to support if they let American oil companies drill. What could possibly go wrong…
- The shooting of an innocent, yes innocent woman driving away or at least having no intention of hitting an ICE agent, in Minnesota. Three shots were fired at her, two directly into the car through an open side window. If shots had to be fired, why weren’t they fired at the tyres? It might have something to do with the fact increasingly out of control ICE agents with the task of rounding up illegal immigrants now only have six weeks training, cut in the first place from a very short three months. She had just dropped her six year old child at school FFS. The blatant re-writing of the history of the event by Trump and JD Vance was pure extremism. Ok to kill a left-wing lesbian apparently… Interestingly, the FBI won’t allow local officials to investigate the incident.
- Threats to Greenland and therefore the NATO Alliance. Trump is happy to take the country ‘the hard way’ as part of his Arctic strategy if Greenland/Denmark don’t capitulate. I don’t actually think he will invade but is doing his usual job of sowing chaos to move the agenda in his own favour. What a way to treat an ally whilst at the same time putting the whole western alliance at risk of disintegration.
- And then this week attacking the independence of the Federal Reserve by steering US prosecutors to investigate its Chairman, Jay Powell, over the renovation of its headquarters, because he won’t cut interest rates when Trump wants him to. You really hope markets punish the US if Trump gets his way and makes the Fed a pawn to his whims.
To add to a growing list, there is the constant undermining of independent judicial processes, the bullying of institutions such as the takeover of the ‘Trump’- Kennedy arts center, the enrichment of the Trump family, the blatant lies when any of Trump’s cabinet open their mouths, the insults to European allies, the cosying up to Putin and downgrading of China, allowing it to catch up with the US all that more quickly.
Trump has a net approval rating of -17%, similar to his first term. This is very weak driven mainly by unhappiness over the cost of living, but incredibly 39% of voters still approve of Trump’s presidency. It is surely time for a dose of morality to be injected into US political debate. When you are the world’s only superpower voters cannot just focus on domestic affairs. The problem is the whole US political system is deeply flawed which sometimes makes stark comparisons of Trump versus others harder to make. But it is time for a reset.
Trump is a rogue president and can only be shamed, not by impotent, increasingly unhappy Republican members of Congress, but by dynamic leadership from the Democrats and the emergence of a clear presidential contender. Umm… good luck on that one.
Inside Right Politics 